UPI is probably the most used method to pay in India. UPI QR codes are everywhere even with the smallest of merchants. Cash and credit cards are getting rare. It is a pretty cool system as there are very small fees and money is instantly moved from Account to Account (A2A).
India UPI historically made it pretty difficult for people without an Indian bank account and India phone number to get UPI. There is also a lot of conflicting information on the internet. Most sites say you have to get verified at a specific location in a city (like a bank). They imply you can verify at an airport but I have never seen an airport place to do this.
What worked for me.
- Install the MONY app from the app store
- Be in India with wifi and your phone texting working.
- Go through their process. Warning it is complicated and multi-stepped. It includes
- scanning your passport
- scanning your visa
- several email and text notifications
- being patient and sometimes restarting the app and waiting
- depositing money in their wallet
- for me I would not want to link to my bank account. I opted for sending money from my credit card (which includes a 3% fee)
- the default is $300 – I changed to the lowest amount allowed which was around $15 US. Be careful with the zeros
- Be prepared to lose the money. They say you can close the account and get the money back but I can’t confirm
Using UPI – typical scenarios
- Merchant says pay 1000 rupees
- You open Mony and have working internet
- scan their QR code
- type in 1000 and submit
- Show your phone to the merchant that the money went through
- Sometimes the merchant will check they received it. Mostly they don’t
- Merchant has terminal with QR code
- same as above but the QR code has the amount embedded
- you approve in the Mony app
Why do all through this hassle?
Major retailers and restaurants also use credit cards. I still used credit cards for larger purchases
Most smaller (street level) people use UPI. If you don’t have it often you can’t pay.
I like to feel a little more like a local or that I belong there.
It is a cool system and the way we should be transacting. You really see how the US is falling behind in financial system. VISA/AMeX/MasterCard have huge fees to merchants (passed on to consumers) that systems like UPI eliminate. China has similar systems and the EU is rapidly expanding their A2A system. US checks (slow), ACH (slow, hard to use), Credit networks (high fees), Venmo/PayPay (stupid)
Note my colleague to the same steps as I and couldn’t get it to work. It looked like it all worked including giving Mony money but he lost the $15.