India’s Move to Make Payments Easier for International Visitors

30.07.2024 - 07:36 / skift.com / Bulbul Dhawan

India’s retail payments body National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) has launched UPI One World wallet for international travelers visiting India. 

The wallet aims to allow travelers to make payments using the instant mobile payments system Unified Payments Interface without requiring an Indian mobile number or bank account. 

What Does This Mean? Introduced in 2023 during the G20 Summit in India and now being rolled out, UPI One World is a prepaid wallet that can be used to make digital payments to merchants across India in INR. 

For Indian residents, the technology is used by linking the user’s phone number and bank account with a virtual payment ID to carry out bank-to-bank transactions instantly. It requires a user to scan a merchant’s QR code using their UPI app and enter their PIN to make the payment. 

The UPI One World wallet forgoes this requirement for Indian number and bank account. According to NPCI, international travelers would be able to use the service with the help of authorized partners at Indian airports in select cities. 

Travelers would only need to show their passports and visas as documentation. They would then be able to load the wallet in INR through their debit or credit cards or via foreign currency exchange at the issuer counter. 

Increasing International Visitor Spending: Indian government’s latest Economic Survey for 2023-24 data showed that the country’s foreign exchange earnings through tourism in 2023 was INR 2.3 trillion ($27.5 billion) – a 66% gain over 2022.

However, according to a recent report by the World Travel and Tourism Council (WTTC), international visitor spending in India remained 14% below the pre-pandemic levels. 

The move to expand the digital payment system to international travelers could boost international visitor spending in the country. It eliminates the need for travelers to pay a forex markup on every transaction through cards.

UPI One World wallet also overcomes the issue of limited amount of available currency with the travelers while protecting them from purchasing INR from unlicensed currency exchange outlets in the markets.

Visit Maldives is holding a three-city roadshow called ‘Welcome India’ starting Tuesday. As part of the campaign, the organization will hold roadshows at Delhi, Mumbai, and Bangalore. 

The roadshow comes after Indian tourists to Maldives declined by about 40% between January and April 15 this year. #BoycottMaldives had started trending in Indian social media following a diplomatic dispute between the two countries in early January, leading to the decline in the tourist footfall to the archipelago.

Maldives has not yet recovered from this. According to data from the Maldives’ ministry of tourism, till July 23 this