The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) on February 15 granted in-principle approval to 32 existing payment aggregators, allowing them to continue their operations.
- Amazon (Pay) India Pvt Ltd, Google India Digital Services Pvt Ltd, Reliance Payment Solutions Ltd and Zomato Payments Pvt Ltd are among the notable entities whose names are present in the list published by the RBI.
About Payments Aggregator (PA) license
- A Payments Aggregator (PA) license, allows companies to provide payment services for merchants (online businesses or e-commerce firms) by accepting payment instruments from customers.
- As part of the process, PAs pool the funds received from customers and transfer them to merchants after a certain time period.
- To protect the welfare of citizens and businesses, the RBI released PA guideline in March 2020 wherein it was highlighted that the payment gateways need a license to acquire merchants and provide them with digital payment acceptance solutions.
- According to RBI rules, a company applying for aggregator authorisation must have a minimum net worth of Rs 15 crore in the first year of application, and at least Rs 25 crore by the second year.
- It also must fulfil the “fit and proper” criteria, and be compliant with global payment security standards. PAs are directly monitored by the RBI.
