Digital payments company PayPal Holdings, Inc. has launched its domestic operations in India, it said in a statement on Wednesday.
Both customers and merchants can avail of the firm’s payments platform to process local and global transactions. Some of the features PayPal offers include one touch, buyer and seller protection, refund/return facility, and 180-days dispute resolution window, the company statement said.
“We will be targeting the global Indian and have partnered with merchants catering to this segment... India is transitioning away from our biggest competitor – cash – and our digital platform and technology has immense scope to enable this at scale,†Anupam Pahuja, county manager and managing director, PayPal India, said.
PayPal has 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. However, it is not planning to introduce cashback offers for customers right away like its rivals, though customers will be eligible for free returns.
The company is also soon expected to offer other products such as working capital to micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs), consumer credit, peer-to-peer transactions and remittances, among others.
The firm has also partnered with the government and state-owned banks for initiatives such as the digital financial literacy programme and eTourist Visa (eTV).
PayPal has become the latest player to join the crowded payments space in India. While the segment is home to digital wallet companies such as Paytm, MobiKwik, and FreeCharge, a number of firms across e-commerce, messaging and social networking are joining the fray.
E-commerce giants Flipkart and Amazon India have their own payment wallets, and they have recently infused fresh funds into them, indicating a sharp focus on payments.
In October, VCCircle reported that Amazon was set to invest funds in its payments arm Amazon Pay (India) Pvt. Ltd. Though the investment amount was not declared, it was estimated to be Rs 1,600 crore ($245 million). In the same month, Flipkart, through its Singapore-based group entity, Flipkart Payments Pvt. Ltd, injected Rs 254.43 crore ($38.7 million) into its unified payments interface-based payments app PhonePe Pvt. Ltd.
Besides e-tailers, global tech giants like Google offer digital wallets. In September, the company launched its Unified Payment Interface (UPI)-based mobile payments app ‘Tez’. In the same month, instant messaging app WhatsApp, owned by social networking giant Facebook Inc., received approval from the National Payments Corporation of India to enable in-app payments via UPI. Facebook, too, is working towards launching payments on its platform.
In October, media reports stated that Cupertino-based smartphone maker Apple Inc. was looking to launch its payments service Apple Pay in India.
