 "YES Bank, Axis Bank go live as payment service providers for Paytm")
As the extended deadline comes to an end for Paytm Payments Bank, YES Bank and Axis Bank have gone live as payment service providers (PSPs) for the Paytm app.
This comes a day after National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) approved Paytm’s request to function as a third-party application provider (TPAP) on the Unified Payments Interface (UPI). Before the RBI’s restrictions on Paytm Payments Bank kicked in, the company’s payments bank enabled UPI transactions on Paytm.
YES Bank has gone live as a PSP bank with a closed group of users with the @ptyes handle. Similarly, Axis Bank is live with a closed group of users with the @ptaxis handle.
State Bank of India (SBI) and HDFC Bank will gradually go live as PSPs. They have handles such as @ptsbi and @pthdfc, respectively, according to the NPCI website.
NPCI did not respond to queries sent by Business Standard. Paytm declined to respond to the queries.
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On Thursday, NPCI had notified that four banks — SBI, Axis Bank, HDFC Bank, and YES Bank — would act as PSPs to Paytm. This would also imply that new users who register on Paytm to transact using UPI will get new virtual payment addresses (VPAs) backed by these four PSPs.
A VPA is a unique identifier that customers use to send and receive money on UPI. Until recently, @paytm was the VPA for users who registered for UPI on the Paytm app. With four banks operating as PSPs, Paytm is operating as a TPAP under a multi-bank model. “@Paytm” handle will be redirected to YES Bank, NPCI had stated on Thursday.
NPCI has advised Paytm to complete the migration of all existing handles and mandates to new PSP banks “at the earliest”.
Last month, the Reserve Bank of India had advised NPCI to consider the request of One97 Communications Ltd to become a TPAP for continued UPI operation of the app. A PSP bank, either through its own application or a TPAP, takes on board and registers customers on UPI, linking customers’ bank accounts to their respective UPI identifications.