India has finally put a price on larger transactions on its ubiquitous digital payments network, ending years of free processing for merchants as authorities seek to make a system used for billions of payments each month financially self-sustaining.
The country’s Unified Payments Interface (UPI) will impose a 0.4% merchant fee on certain payments above ₹2,000 (about $21) from October 15, the National Payments Corporation of India, which operates the network, said on Tuesday. Consumers will continue to use the service for free, NPCI said.