The National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) has directed banks and payment service providers not to accept UPI payment transactions through non-compliant apps. NPCI said in a circular to all the UPI-supported banks in the BHIM ecosystem saying it is mandatory for all UPI apps to have support for sending or receiving money through virtual payment addresses, generate QR codes for Bharat QR or UPI QR and accept payments by scanning, and respond to intent call on the same phone. While all banks and merchants are required to follow this directive, NPCI said those running merchant-only business are excluded on certain counts. However, they are still required to accept and send payments through VPA. They must also have the ability to scan QR codes and respond to collect requests that originate on other phones. NPCI wants to improve the interoperability between apps on the UPI platform while there are concerns that NPCI giving itself and banks the power to reject transactions originating from non-compliant apps could further ruin the user experience of UPI.
