Amazon Pay expands UPI services by enabling P2P transactions

Amazon Pay has begun offering peer-to-peer (P2P) transaction thought the Unified Payments Interface (UPI). It went live on the UPI platform in February after partnering with Axis Bank.

With P2P transactions, the company will be able to provide its full range of UPI services. The move will also help Amazon Pay expand its business-to-business (B2B) services for kirana stores.

Amazon's rivals Paytm, Google Pay and PhonePe have already enabled P2P transactions on their platform.

UPI transactions, currently free, might soon come with an additional cost. Kotak Mahindra Bank has already said that starting May 1 it will charge users after the first 30 P2P transactions.

Google Pay has taken the lead in the UPI transactions space, clocking payments worth Rs 43,000-45,000 crore in March.

Rival Amazon Pay claims that its success rate is two-to-three percentage points higher than industry standards.

"We will be improving and strengthening our bank and NPCI integrations further, aiming for a 100 percent success rate," Vikas Bansal, Director for Amazon Pay India, was quoted as saying by The Economic Times.

Amazon Pay is also pushing its offline presence, and has introduced 'scan and pay' services at Shopper Stop stores. The payments service provider wants to introduce the scan and pay service, which uses QR codes, at More stores as well, according to a Mint report.