WhatsApp Pay has been running in India in beta testing for over two years now. The payments method hasn't been able to launch officially in India due to some roadblocks. It is now reported that WhatsApp Pay will be official in India by May-end.
According to a report by Money Control, WhatsApp Pay will be available for all users in India by May-end. It will launch with ICICI Bank, Axis Bank and HDFC Bank. The report however adds that State Bank of India (SBI) which is also one of the partners for WhatsApp Pay will not be available at launch. It will roll out support sometime later. The payments service however supports numerous banks in India which have UPI enabled.
The report also adds that WhatsApp is complying to the Reserve Bank of India's data localisation norms, which has been the major reason behind the launch delay. WhatsApp is however said to launch its payment service in a phased manner so as to help banks deal with the load of transactions. WhatsApp has 400 million users in India which is its biggest market globally.
WhatsApp started beta testing its UPI-based payments service in India back in February, 2018. India is also the first market where the Facebook-owned company piloted the service. It was first available to select WhatsApp users but others could get the service easily as those who had it just had to initiate a payment.
WhatsApp Pay is expected to be a huge success for the company considering the number of users in India, and the ease of use since users don't have to download another app. WhatsApp Pay while boosting the country's digital payments market will also give stiff competition to existing players like Google Pay and Paytm.
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