payment methods india
 

will be visiting delhi,chennai,jaipur in a few weeks-and was wondering what is the best way to pay?
is it necessary to carry a lot of cash or is credit card widely accepted at even small places?
there is the ATm option-but it seems that the fees are quite high-any advice much appreciated!

The demonetization in 2017 pushed many to accept cards and digital payment options. Google pay is quite common, the Indian payment apps are sadly not accesible to visitors. You will require some cash, if you pull 10 000 INR once from an ATM it will cover you for quite some time.

Does a US-account Google Pay, charging a US credit card, work in India, given India's mandatory security rules? I saw a report that it does not, but iI don't know if it is correct.

I tried it once and neither the salesperson nor I could find how to ask the app to read the merchant's QR code, so I gave up and paid cash.

Uk Google pay does not work in India..I tested it last month on my last trip and so US one is also unlikely to work

As far as I know you need to set it up with the indian version of Google pay with an Indian card

What worked very well for me was contactless transactions with my UK cards . Most of the larger shops / supermarkets had contactless payment terminals ( This is called a WIFI card / WIFI payment in India) .

I know that there is a lot of fear about contactless cards but my personal view is that a card like revolut that can be topped up ( prepaid ) is safer than using normal cards . Also don't have to key in my pin on some strange terminal that I don't know .

At the end of the day, cash is still king in India.

Having said that, almost every vendor across the country will give you the option to pay using your credit card.

Google Pay, Paytm, WhatsApp Pay are all very popular however they require an Indian credit card.

Almost all retail stores, even tiny ones, will accept credit cards. Many have upgraded their terminals to accept NFC (contactless), so you can use Apple Pay or Google Pay as well. However, you will run into some situations where merchants are unwilling or unable to accept foreign credit cards (because the fees they pay are higher or whatever), so this can be a problem sometimes and it's good to have some cash in hand most of the time. You may also find that you have to try more than one credit card until one works, as it seems acceptance and fraud monitoring vary widely by payment processors. Also auto-rickshaws and taxis will often ask for cash. Even if you use Uber / Ola they'll sometimes ask for payment in cash. Sometimes you can add tips (for restaurants, etc.) to your bill and pay by credit card, but tipping in most situations will only work with cash.

Summary: Credit cards will mostly work, but take along more than one, and always have backup cash - you can't do without cash.

Yes, ATM withdrawals will incur high fees, however, there's no alternative, really - you just have to plan ahead, estimate how much cash you might need for your whole trip, and manage your withdrawals to reduce the total amount of fees you end up paying. If you're left with some rupees at the end of your trip, you can keep some as a souvenir or for your next trip (but beware there is a limit on how much cash in rupees can be taken out of India), or give them to a friend, or blow them all in food and duty-free stuff at the airport. :)

Google Pay in India is a different app than Google Pay elsewhere. Google Pay for Indian users requires an Indian mobile number (and can only be used in India) and offers payment via the local UPI payment network using a local bank account. If you have Google Pay from outside India, you can use it to enable contactless payments with your credit cards, but you cannot use it for UPI payments. The QR codes for UPI payments are different from and incompatible with the QR codes used in (US-based) Google Pay for person-to-person payments. In India, if you pull out your phone to pay by NFC (contactless), the vendor may ask if you want to use "Google Pay" - and if you say yes, they'll pull up a UPI QR code which won't work for you. Always tell them you're using a credit card, to avoid this confusion over "Google Pay". Apple Pay apparently remains banned for Indian users, although you can use your Apple Pay if you're from outside India for contactless payments.

It works only for NFC contactless ("tap") payments from your phone. Scanning a QR code won't work - US Google Pay uses a different format of QR codes to manage person-to-person payments, whereas the Indian Google Pay works with UPI QR codes and they are not compatible. When the merchant generated a QR code for you, that was for his UPI payment account.

Were you able to do a contactless payment with a non indian Google pay account and a foreign card

I attempted to do this last month with UK Google pay and UK card and it didn't work..

Yes, several times. US Google Pay and US based credit cards (one Barclays MasterCard, one Chase Visa, another Bank of America MasterCard). But I also ran into a couple of situations where "foreign cards don't work", period, regardless of swipe / insert / tap.

And I think it's a matter of pure luck that this time in India I did not run into the random instances of my credit card company deciding to decline charges in India "for my protection", which has happened randomly in the past.

So if I understand correctly, GPay is identical to using the actual card for non-contact payments. If a card won't work, GPay won't work either. If so, there's no compelling reason not to use the physical cards.

You can also exchange the leftover Rs at a currency exchange window. You'll lose some money in fees and/or bad exchange rate, of course. In the old days they would need to see your ATM receipts to make sure you weren't taking out more than you brought in, but these days the allowed maximum is high enough that it is not a problem in most cases.

There are two reasons one might want to use Google Pay / Apple Pay contactless payments: (1) The app does not share your actual credit card number with the merchant, instead a virtual card number is exchanged with the POS terminal. So it's a bit safer for you in that your credit card number cannot be stolen and misused somewhere else; and (2) of course you don't have to carry the cards with you and risk losing them somewhere and being used fraudulently. Or to flip it around, if you do lose your wallet but still have your phone, it's not the end of the world, and you can still use your cards loaded in the app for payment.

Yes, yes, but the context of this thread is, what are our options for payment in India? GPay is not something different to try if one's cards do not work.

Another factor is that you don't have to input a pin.. Majority of card cloning happens when you card is cloned and someone gets your PIN ( by hidden cameras etc).. This information is then used to generate a cloned card.

Since the actual card information is not shared ( and no PIN) I feel this is more secure

However I still use a revolut or some other card I can top up and never use my debit card linked to my main bank account .

Gpay with foreign CCs in India works spotty at best. The moment your phone notices that you are in India the Gpay app changes from the EU/US version to the Indian version. The first time I noticed this was during my trip in September 22: the icon and text of my app went from a logo of a few cards and a title 'wallet' changed to 'Gpay'. I managed to pay once using my German card when my physical HDFC Rupay card was not working. Since I don't use my foreign cards in India and try to use the Rupay card where ever possible it was not a major hassle.

Regarding cash and how to dispose it: note that foreigners are technically not allowed to take INR currency notes/bills out of the country. Of course thats not really feasible and no one cares. I try to use it up as much as possible, the easiest is to pay the hotel with whatever cash you have left (hotels can always settle the payment with a mix of credit card & cash) and just keep a small amount for the taxi to the airport.

Wow - that must have been quite something, to see the app change like that. Do you have an Indian mobile number registered to your Google account by any chance? I don't see how it could switch to the Indian version since the Indian version is so closely tied to having an Indian mobile number.

FWIW, I did not notice any changes to my Google Pay app (US-based). The interface looked exactly as it always does and it behaved as expected with my US-based credit cards. One caveat - my app just recently (in the last couple of weeks) switched to the new interface that combines the old Google Pay and Google Wallet apps in a new presentation - Google has been rolling this out to everyone recently. It's possible also that your Google Pay app behaved differently if it hasn't yet been "upgraded" in this way?

This has not been true for nearly a decade. Back in 2014 the RBI allowed foreigners to take in and out up to ₹25,000 - the limit may be higher now, not sure. Curiously, foreigners may take cash in and out this way only when entering or leaving at an airport, not for land and sea travel. I suppose the land restriction is intended to curb physical movement of cash to bad actors based in Pakistan.

https://rbi.org.in/Scripts/Notificat...Id=8949&Mode=0

No Indian phone number in my google profile. Will observe my phone in two weeks and report back.

Sorry, the CBIC says:

https://www.cbic.gov.in/resources/ht...VELLERS_v5.pdf

When demonitization happened in 2017 this rule created a lot of trouble for anyone who had cash left with them. Only NRIs were allowed to bring back 25000/- ;)

Wow, thanks for that update. Super-confusing that the CBIC guide would contradict the RBI. When the RBI published its updated rules in 2014 there was some buzz in travel forums about the relaxed currency regulations, which is where I had heard about it.

I'm certainly not a lawyer and no-one should rely on me for advice on such stuff :) but I wonder if there's even a possibility the guidebook has simply not been updated correctly? The CBIC's website that lists the specific customs rules for currency only points back to the FEMA notifications, which are what the RBI notice references.

Anyway, this is probably getting off-topic for this thread. Probably best to go with the more restrictive rules in any case. Although I'll say that in years of traveling to India I've never heard of anyone being checked or questioned about INR being carried out (and even some cases where the officers seems to have seen INR and not cared about it).

Interesting bit is that a member I know in another group was able to buy Indian rupees from a UK airport using a forex service ( obviously at a poor exchange rate )

I didnt know that this was possible and wonder if things have changed..
I have previously heard of people doing this using a grey market service online or from shops in areas in UK with a large Indian population.

The being able to exchange GBP into rupees at a UK airport is news to me .

INR were always available at bigger forex shops at atrociously stupid rates. I recall selling some INR to DM in Berlin in the late 80s. That is form the time FERA and FEMA were in full force. The ED paid a visit to us in 1985 in the village and confesticated a grand sum of 300 DM from my mother. That FERA case took 10 years to resolve 🤦‍♂️

Things were really silly at the time. My uncle was moving to Australia in the 70's and he was only allowed to buy a tiny amount of AUD legally. ( something like 50 dollars) . Even for the time it was a tiny amount..

Sure enough last night the Google Wallet app switched to Google Pay once we were in India.


https://cimg9.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...bbc0478e02.jpg

Wow! <smh> Thanks for the update. Are you able to use your non-Indian credit cards fine from the app now? Any difference at all in functionality that you notice in how you can use your credit cards, etc.?

It would also be interesting to test whether adding an Indian payment method or signing up for UPI is feasible now with the app in this state. If so, that would be the best of both worlds for frequent travelers / NRIs who have access to Indian banks.

Other Indian mobile wallets like PayTM simply don't let you sign up with a non-Indian phone number.

I cannot sign up to paytm even with an indian phone number. It could be a block on my number ( paytm used to work but then they wanted kyc and I didn't have the aadhar card number to do that )

Perhaps of interest to those here who have non-resident Indian bank accounts, it looks like UPI payment methods will soon be available to you even if your bank accounts are linked to non-Indian mobile numbers. Whether this means the annoyances with different versions of Google Pay inside and outside India or being able to use PayTM without being an Indian resident, I am not entirely sure.

https://economictimes.indiatimes.com...w/96911584.cms

Just to report back: adding my HDFC NRO account or Rupay card to the app was not possible since it is linked to my German mobile number. My Indian mobile numer is not linked to any bank account so that didn't work either. However I once use the app/phone to pay using NFC (or 'tap' as its called in India) and it worked without issues.

So I ran into an issue with Air Vista. Purchasing the original ticket with a US Amex was no issue whatsoever. I'm now trying to pay for a instant business class upgrade but there Amex is not an available payment option and neither US nor EU credit cards are processed successfully.
Any suggestions?

The upgrades are run by plusgrade.com & not directly by Vistara, maybe if you try calling Vistara they can upgrade you directly using the original card.

FWIW I'm surprised the original purchase worked with a US issued amex, that's never worked for me purchasing directly on the vistara website.

That is helpful I didn't make that connection Very unfortunate.

I've booked 4 flights since last year directly with AirVistara, always using a US Amex. I do get the Safekey Extra safety measures but payments all went through.
I only had one Indigo purchase but that worked the same way..

It appears that it may be possible in the near future for G-20 travelers to India arriving at BOM, BLR, and DEL to get some sort of a prepaid debit card or mobile wallet loaded with INR to use for UPI transactions in India.

https://www.thehindu.com/business/rb...le66537286.ece

https://www.devdiscourse.com/article...om-g20-nations

How convenient this is may well depend on how easy it is to get this set up at the airport, and how easy it is to get a refund of unspent INR on the way out.

The original press release:

https://www.rbi.org.in/scripts/FS_Pr...rid=55263&fn=9

I am on iOS. The gPay app has remained the US version. I do have a US mobile # and no indian #. Attempting to add my indian accounts to this GPay app lands on the US plaid site that ends up only finding US banks.
I tried uninstalling and installing GPay. But the Apple App store is tied by location to the US. Changing location in iOS settings threatens to wipe all US purchases etc. Not worth the effort of reconfiguring my phone once back in the US.

Waiting for the prepaid wallet linked to UPI to be enabled and rolled out. Better than status quo

That’s very interesting. I have non-resident Indian bank accounts and manage well with an Indian debit card (and cash) on my visits. However last month (mid-Feb), we were at the end of a long day in a hired taxi in a remote part of south India. The cabbie had said he accepted electronic payments, but I didn’t realize what that meant — a UPI based app. It seems US based Google Pay works for payments to “friends and family” in India and Singapore, and uses the Wise (formerly Transferwise) wire transfer service. We were low on cash, and no one had an Indian UPI set up on their phones. I also didn’t have my US checking account linked to GPay — just a few credit cards. In order to use GPay, I had to have his phone number saved in my phone as a contact, and also have his “UPI ID” handy. It took a while to get this across (I don’t speak any South Indian language) … eventually he just gave me his phone and I saw a UPI ID underneath the QR Code, if I recall correctly. Using his phone number and this ID, I was able to use the Wise service to transfer money to him. I took about 30 minutes to go through … and we assured him that if he didn’t get the money, he could come back to our hotel and wake us up and we’d go find an ATM!

Just one thing — because I had paid using my Chase credit card, in addition to the (very low) Wise fee, I was hit with a Cash Advance transaction fee (5% of the total amount) and a cash advance interest charge at a 29% APR that started accruing the day of the transaction. I didn’t realize this until I just saw my statement. Ugh.

So, it seems one can use foreign (US) GPay in India. It’s a bit tedious, and absolutely one should have one’s checking account linked to GPay, unless one wants to have a cash advance charge on a credit card.

On my next visit, I’ll either set up PayTM (I have an Indian mobile number). Or just stick to cash!

Very interested to hear back on any (success) stories on this...