RuPay is an Indian domestic card scheme conceived and launched by the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI). It was created to fulfill the Reserve Bank of India’s desire to have a domestic, open loop, and multilateral system of payments in India. RuPay facilitates electronic payment at all Indian banks and financial institutions, and competes with MasterCard and Visa in India. NPCI maintains ties with Discover Financial to enable the card scheme to gain international acceptance.
The IndiaPay scheme was conceived by the National Payments Corporation of India as an alternative to the MasterCard and Visa card schemes, and to consolidate and integrate various payment systems in India. It was renamed to RuPay to avoid naming conflicts with other financial institutions using the same name.
The RuPay card was launched on 26 March 2012. NPCI entered into a strategic partnership with Discover Financial Services (DFS) for RuPay Card, enabling the acceptance of RuPay Global Cards on Discover’s global payment network outside of India. On 8th May 2014, RuPay has been dedicated to India by President of India, Pranab Mukherjee at Rashtrapati Bhavan, New Delhi.
Benefits of RuPay Card
The benefits of RuPay debit card are the flexibility of the product platform, high levels of acceptance and the strength of the RuPay brand-all of which will contribute to an increased product experience.
Lower cost and affordability : Since the transaction processing will happen domestically, it would lead to lower cost of clearing and settlement for each transaction. This will make the transaction cost affordable and will drive usage of cards in the industry.
Customized product offering : RuPay, being a domestic scheme is committed towards development of customized product and service offerings for Indian consumers.
Protection of information related to Indian consumers : Transaction and customer data related to RuPay card transactions will reside in India.
Provide electronic product options to untapped/unexplored consumer segment : There are under-penetrated/untapped consumers segments in rural areas that do not have access to banking and financial services. Right pricing of RuPay products would make the RuPay cards more economically feasible for banks to offer to their customers. In addition, relevant product variants would ensure that banks can target the hitherto untapped consumer segments.
Inter-operability between payment channels and products : RuPay card is uniquely positioned to offer complete inter-operability between various payments channels and products. NPCI currently offers varied solutions across platforms including ATMs, mobile technology, cheques etc and is extremely well placed in nurturing RuPay cards across these platforms.
The vision of NPCI being able to provide citizens of our country anytime, anywhere payment services which are simple, easy to use, safe, and secure, fast and also cost effective. NPCI aims to operate for the benefit of all the member banks and the common man at large.
The Objectives of RuPay is to consolidate and integrate all retail payment systems such that they are: Inclusive, Customer Friendly, Varied yet simple, Universal accessible, Available round the clock, Affordable to all, Fully Automated, and world Class.
“RuPay”, the word itself has a sense of nationality in it. “RuPay” is the coinage of two terms Rupee and Payment. The RuPay Visual Identity is a modern and dynamic unit. The orange and green arrows indicate a nation on the move and a service that matches its pace. The color blue stands for the feeling of tranquility which is the people must get while owning a card of the brand ‘RuPay’. The bold and unique typeface grants solidity to the whole unit and symbolizes a stable entity.
RuPay Scheme provides flexibility to card issuing banks to issue special purpose cards like Kisan Cards, Milk Procurement Cards, Grain Procurement Cards and Financial Inclusion Cards.
NPCI has rolled out its chip card for high security transactions using EMV(Europay, MasterCard and Visa) chip technology, which is a global standard for debit and credit cards. RuPay chip cards have an embedded microprocessor circuit containing information about the card holder and because transactions are PIN-based rather than signature-based.