PayPal Joins India’s Crowded Digital Payments Party
It will act as a payment aggregator and work with banks to offer digital payment services.
Global digital payments pioneer PayPal Holdings Inc. commenced operations in a crowded Indian market today, the first anniversary of demonetisation.
Indian consumers can now use PayPal to shop online at some of the most popular businesses, the company said in a statement. The firm has already tied up with some of the large merchants like BookMyShow, Yatra and MakeMyTrip, among others.
“Merchants offering PayPal will be able to process both local and global payments, getting access to PayPal’s 218 million customers around the world and in India through a single integration,” it said.
India’s Digital payments industry is expected to grow 10 times to $500 billion by 2020, up from current estimates of $40-50 billion, according to a report by advisory firm IMAP. The government has been pushing for a cashless economy.
PayPal, which has been offering cross-border payments in India for close to a decade, will now compete with the likes of Paytm, Google Tez, Amazon Pay, BHIM and soon-to-be launched payments platform of WhatsApp.
It will act as a payment aggregator and work with banks to offer digital payments services to customers, Anupam Pahuja, its country manager and managing director, told BloombergQuint over the phone.
The company eyes aggressive expansion in India and is looking for partnerships to accelerate business plans in India, Pahuja said. The firm hasn’t applied for a prepaid payments instruments licence in India yet but is looking into it, he said.
PayPal, which is present in about 200 countries globally, introduced One Touch, buyer and seller protection, refunded return and a 180-day dispute resolution window as some of the benefits on the platform.
We will be bringing all of PayPal’s global capabilities like working capital, consumer credit, peer-to-peer payments in a social way, remittances and others to India. The question is not if we will bring in to India, but when we will be bringing them to India.Anupam Pahuja, Country Manager and Managing Director, PayPal
The company has also set up a customer service centre in India with multi-lingual support capabilities and an on-ground sales team to drive customer engagement and education, he said.