Facebook-owned WhatsApp is all set to launch its digital payment service WhatsApp Pay to its customers in India soon. As most of us know, WhatsApp is one of the popular messaging service apps in the market. What’s App, therefore, can easily take leverage over its 400 million users across the country to market its digital payment service WhatsApp Pay.
According to reports by Business Standard, the WhatsApp Pay feature is finally set to hit the market, as WhatsApp has complied with the Reserve Bank of India’s guidelines and the government’s data localization norms.
WhatsApp Pay began its development two years ago in India, but due to the Indian government’s rules on data localization, it could not immediately launch the new payment feature. It is reported that WhatsApp was storing numerous payment data elements outside India, including Expiry of collect request, retrieval reference numbers, transaction ID, etc. The Indian Government wanted WhatsApp to safely secure the data of Indian users if WhatsApp wants to roll out the payment feature.
The absence of a local grievance officer for WhatsApp in India was also one of the reasons for its delayed launch. According to reports, WhatsApp has now complied with all the regulations posed by the Government Of India (GOI). It will soon launch its WhatsApp Pay feature to its millions of users.
WhatsApp Pay will undoubtedly be a great rival to other digital payment services in India including Phone Pe, Amazon Pay, Paytm, Google Pay Etc. It will be a great competitor to the Unified Payments Interface (UPI) platform.
At least 30.8 million people download WhatsApp every month. It has around 400 million consumers. The most popular digital payment app Google pay is gaining about 15.5 million monthly downloads. WhatsApp has double the download rate compared to Google Play.
This huge user base is a big advantage for WhatsApp to take leverage over its consumers to introduce its new WhatsApp Pay feature. The users can easily send or receive money to their contact list using WhatsApp Pay. The QR code will allow them to send or receive money from people outside their contact list through the QR code, just like other digital payment apps do.
WhatsApp is a Facebook-owned messaging platform. Facebook’s recent tie-up with Reliance Jio’sJio Mart will be a huge benefit for WhatsApp. Facebook recently picked a 9.9 percent stake in Reliance Industries. Through this, the messaging platform can allow the user to order, book, or purchase items without even having to leave the app.
Reports suggest that there is an idea to integrate Jio Mart into WhatsApp, which will make WhatsApp as the payment option. WhatsApp is currently working with government, financial institutions, and banks to offer financial services including pension, product credit, Insurance, etc. All these are mainly concentrated in rural areas. With all this information we can sure believe that WhatsApp Pay will be available anytime soon for Indian users.