The National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) will roll out new Unified Payments Interface (UPI) rules from today to enhance efficiency and safeguard users against fraud.
These rules will be applicable to all UPI service providers, including Google Pay, PhonePe, and Paytm, and will impact activities such as balance enquiries, autopayments, bank detail access, and transaction status checks.
Key Changes in UPI Usage
-
Bank Balance Enquiry Limit
-
Users can check their bank balance up to 50 times a day.
-
During peak hours, UPI apps may limit or block balance requests to ease network load.
-
The available balance will now be displayed with every transaction.
-
-
Auto Payment Restrictions
-
Autopay transactions will only be processed during non-peak hours:
-
Before 10 am
-
Between 1 pm – 5 pm
-
After 9:30 pm
-
-
Payments scheduled during peak hours may be processed earlier or later.
-
Failed autopayments will get a retry option before cancellation.
-
-
Bank Details Access
-
Users can view linked bank accounts only 25 times a day.
-
Requests must be initiated manually after selecting the issuer bank.
-
-
Transaction Status Updates
-
Pending transactions will now update within seconds, instead of showing “pending” for long.
-
Status can be checked only three times, with a 90-second gap between attempts.
-
-
Recipient Verification
-
Before confirming any payment, the sender will see the registered name of the recipient along with the transaction ID.
-
Compliance and Penalties
NPCI has warned that non-compliance could result in API restrictions, penalties, suspension of new customer onboarding, or other measures.
These changes aim to make UPI transactions faster, safer, and less vulnerable to fraud, while reducing system congestion during high traffic periods.
