WhatsApp Payments to hit the market soon :Here’s how it works

After the successful launch of the ‘business variant’ of the most popular chat messenger WhatsApp, they are planning to roll out a UPI based WhatsApp Payments system. Rumors were all over the place regarding the person-to-person UPI based payment system of WhatsApp, but there was no official word on this matter yet. It was then when people started seeing this feature in the new beta build.

During our first run, we found that the WhatsApp payments system can only be used to pay amongst your contacts and not to any WhatsApp Business profile holder. The Facebook-owned company WhatsApp has joined hands with several banks for the generation and handling the UPI based payment protocols, State Bank of India, ICICI, HDFC and Axis banks are some of them.

What’s new for users? How ‘WhatsApp Payments’ is different from all the other payment apps?

There are already plenty of Payment apps offering similar services and options to their users such as PayTM, Google Tez, PhonePe but what they lag is ‘Database.’ Suppose, if you are to send some money to someone, you need to add or send an invite to the recipient, which is both irritating and tiresome.

On the other hand, WhatsApp has almost all the people whom you talk to on a daily basis, and therefore it won’t be an issue for you to send payments in a jiffy.

In short, WhatsApp Payments = no invite or any fuss just tap and rush.

Schedule of the rollout?

The WhatsApp Payments interface as mentioned earlier has recently been surfaced the web, thanks to the beta testers; the final version though is soon to be rolled out to both the Android and iOS users of WhatsApp.

How to enroll and avail the WhatsApp Payments once it arrives?

As the WhatsApp Payments interface is based and works on the Unified Payments Interface (UPI), the sender and the recipient must have to link their mobile numbers (registered with the bank account) to avail this feature.

If you are already enrolled in the Unified Payments Interface or UPI, you’ll also be given the liberty to add your pre-existing UPI address.

For the new UPI users, all they need to do is, fill in the required details such as your mobile number, your name and passwords and you are good to go. Here is how it is done:

1. Head over to the contact to whom you want to send money to and look for the option ‘Send Money’.
2. Now, the interface will ask for your mobile number (registered with the bank) and will send an SMS to confirm.
3. After the verification of the OTP, all the bank accounts linked to your mobile number will be displayed, and you have to choose, the account you need your money to be sent from.
4. Create a UPI password, and you are good to go.
5. Now enter the amount that you need to send and tap on the ‘Pay’ button to continue.
6. Enter your UPI password; the amount will get transferred in a jiffy.
7. You’ll get a confirmation SMS for the transaction that you made.

Although some 5-10 apps are offering similar functionality, WhatsApp Payments will surely do wonders because all your near and dear ones are on the chat messenger already.