UPI transaction value hits a record Rs 1.52 lakh crore in May despite 6% drop in its count

The latest data released by the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) on its official Twitter handle shows that the number of Unified Payment Interface (UPI) transactions has fallen 6 per cent to 733.54 million in May 2019 from 781.79 million in April 2019. The transaction count had hit its highest-ever mark of 799.54 million in March.

However, there is no dip in terms of the value of these transactions - on the contrary it has shot up over 14 per cent since March. The UPI transaction value stood at Rs 1.33 lakh crore in March, Rs 1.42 lakh crore in April and a record Rs 1.52 lakh crore in May 2019.

UPI is a real-time payments system that enables digital transactions between banks without the need to input NFSC code and other bank account details. All users need to do is make sure is that their mobile number is linked to their bank account(s). Launched in April 2016, the system now boasts 144 live banks.

Although digital transactions tend to fluctuate every month, UPI has seen consistent growth in the past year. The number of transactions has shot up a whopping 287 per cent year-on-year from 189 million in May 2018, The Economic Times reported. Driving the growth are players such as PhonePe, Google Pay and Paytm.

However, the Aadhaar-enabled payment system (AePS) has seen a dip both in terms of transaction count and value in the current fiscal. As per NPCI data, the number of AePS transactions has dropped from close to 198 million in April to 192.11 million in May while the value has slid 1.3 per cent to Rs 9228.59 crore last month.

The RBI's latest vision document sees payment systems like UPI registering an average annualised growth of over 100% and NEFT at 40% till 2021. The number of digital transactions is expected to increase more than four times to over 87 billion in the same time frame.

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