On a recent trip to India I observed that my (US) Google Wallet app appeared to have lost all its loaded (US-issued) credit and debit cards. Only non-payment passes and my airline boarding passes were available, no payment methods. Attempting to re-add a couple of my credit cards resulted in a non-specific error ("an error occurred, please try again later") and in consequence I wasn't able to use my phone for contactless credit card payments at all. Not a big loss, of course I had my credit cards along and was able to pay with them. But I've just got very used to using my phone for purchases where I can, at home.

When I left India all my credit and debit cards returned in the app exactly as they were before I had reached India.

On previous trips to India the Google Wallet app (or Google Pay as it was also available as in the US) worked for contactless payments in India, and all credit cards, etc., loaded into the app were fine inside or outside India.

This may have something to do with this news that Google Wallet will be launching in India, tweaked for Indian customers (while also keeping the separate India-specific Google Pay app)
https://techcrunch.com/2024/04/16/go...-india-launch/

It would be sad if when all of this settles out with the Wallet & Pay situation in India, foreign Android users are left without a way to use their phones for contactless payments. Not sure if Apple Pay works either.

I just ran into this a couple days ago myself. I was setting up an old Pixel 3a as a backup phone and although I was able to start adding an American card to Wallet, I got a similar non-specific error when trying to confirm it. My Google account is a bit geographically confused, so I thought it was just a me problem but I guess not.

Apple Pay works fine--all my non-Indian cards are still functional, and my transit cards are still there as well. At some point it did remove my American driver's license even though it's years from expiration, though.

This is part of a whole new set of RBI regulations that have been rolled out recently over the last year or so. Some are already in place while some have been announced & on hold to be implemented in the near future. Basically there are restrictions on loading non Indian issued credit cards for phone payments in India.

We talked about this last year?

payment methods india

Google wallet becomes 'google pay' in my phone and allows the use of foreign cc via NFC/tap.

Yes, I remember. However, at the time of that discussion, and until at least as recently as March 2024, my experience was that my Google Pay / Google Wallet continued to work for contactless payments from my phone with my US-issued credit cards (several trips to India). This new experience (April 2024) is the first time that I am seeing that the cards simply disappear from the app and contactless payments are therefore not possible. I don't know if this is related to the Google Pay → Google Wallet switch in the US, or to the imminent roll-out of Google Wallet in India, or perhaps progressively stricter enforcement of whatever RBI directives may have already been in place for some time that restrict phone payments.

Any chance you can point to the details on these restrictions? I'm wondering... Why on earth would the RBI want to restrict non-Indian cards just for contactless payments? Contactless from a phone is, in my understanding, way more secure than other ways to use a credit card - and meanwhile simply tapping the card itself for a contactless payment seems to still be allowed (I did that once on my recent trip), and that's way more unsafe in principle (a stolen card can be used by someone without PIN or other authentication) and I could see them wanting to ban that. But from the phone? Hmm. It's even more perplexing to hear that Apple Pay works fine, so only Google phone payments are blocked? This is a head-scratcher.

Well, I guess the bottom line is to always be prepared for changes in these regulations, and carry back-up cards, cash, or be prepared to do a bank transfer, etc., when visiting India.

With the RBI & all the recent restrictions, its difficult to find logic in their decisions. I was told by someone very senior in the Indian banking sector that it has something to do with receiving an OTP on your phone & currently only Indian numbers are able to receive that.

The Paytm 'scandal' has led to tightening of control by the RBI. Just look at the latest prublication that came out yesterday: https://rbi.org.in/scripts/Publicati....aspx?Id=12043

Lots of changes. All 'phoren' banks and service providers are following the rules by the letter not to become a target in this election year. Google has quietly removed India from the list of countries in their official list:

https://support.google.com/wallet/an...t-for-payments

Here's a weird data point:

I recently got a new phone from the US. As soon as it realized it was in India, "add a payment card" disappeared from Google Wallet. Trying to add cards from within bank apps didn't work either, except for a German card that did add--but the whole interface is hidden so I can't do anything with it. It does work to pay for things, though: when I tap my unlocked phone to a contactless reader, the standard Google Wallet screen with the card image pops up and the card goes through.

Apple Pay continues to work fine in India with cards from any country where it's supported, and you can still add new cards while in India. I guess Apple isn't running India's second largest UPI app so they're not under the microscope.

The particularly ironic part is that my Google account is "American" so I can't even download the Indian GPay (UPI) app.

edit: I'm now sitting in Europe with a local SIM and after a couple hours, the payment card functionality reappeared so now I can change my default card. Still can't add my Capital One card so that's probably a them problem.

One more data point. Very similar to the experience of der_saeufer above. On my most recent trip to India, I noticed again that my US-region Google Wallet app switched to only showing me my loyalty cards and boarding passes in it, and no payment methods. However, the small icon for the wallet in the top pull-down options (Android) still showed the icon and last 4 digits of my default contactless payment card. Experimentally I tried using the phone for contactless payment a couple of times and it worked fine. It's just that the payment card is nowhere to be seen in the app while I'm in India. It also means that I couldn't change it to use any of the other cards stored in the app either.

App stayed in that "locked" condition during a short stop-over in London (no telling if it would have changed had I stayed longer). But a few minutes after landing in the US it reverted to showing me all my payment methods in the app just like before.

So I guess the only thing to be learned from this is, you *can* continue to use a US-region Google Wallet app for contactless payments in India, but be sure to set your preferred payment card as the default, as you can't change it once you're in India.

This limitation arises because Google Wallet's contactless payment features are not universally supported across all countries. According to Google's support documentation, the availability of certain payment features depends on the user's country or region.

For international travelers in India, it's advisable to carry physical credit or debit cards as a reliable payment method. While some merchants, particularly in larger cities, may accept contactless payments via NFC, this practice is not yet widespread.

I find it difficult to understand your response, it's like saying things aren't supported because they're not supported.

The EMV consortium protocol for contactless payments is the same at all payment POS terminals world-wide.
Google Pay and any other contactless credit card payment method works in exactly the same way in India as elsewhere too.
Whether a particular merchant accepts contactless payments or not, or whether there are local restrictions on the transaction amount, etc., are not relevant here - and similar constraints exist in every other country.
In fact a US-based Google Wallet (Google Pay) does not block you from using contactless payments in India at all - as mentioned up-thread, it's just that the interface changes and one can no longer see all of one's saved cards or switch between them. Only the default card continues to be used. This is the puzzling part that we are discussing in this thread.

For now, the only "solution" is to ensure you have your desired contactless payment card set up as the default in the Google app before you enter India for a trip.

No, this limitation arises because Google has chosen to break the interface for some reason. Apple Pay is also not supported in India, but if you have a card from a supported country you can use it just fine. Google Pay used to work here too. Perhaps it's because Google intends to add NFC to their UPI app and doesn't want the two to conflict, though UPI over NFC is a solution looking for a problem.

I haven't seen a credit card machine that doesn't take contactless in at least a year. Plenty of small shops and roadside vendors take only cash or UPI, but anywhere that will take a foreign credit card will take contactless. All Indian cards have been contactless for a while now. The challenge in places that don't see a lot of foreigners is that the clerk or waiter will assume you want to use UPI when he sees a phone.

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Update from my most recent trips to India. It appears that now you can select different payment methods or set a different default contactless payment method by opening the (US region) Wallet app directly (at least on Android) when in India. However, curiously, it is still impossible to do either of those things from the wallet "tile" you get when you swipe down from the top - that still shows up greyed out as soon as you land in India, and only allows the default contactless payment method to be used. I did not try to add a new payment method while in India, so I'm not sure that's possible yet.

But I wouldn't recommend relying on this, never know when Google might change things again based on their whims and interpretation of Indian regulations. Best to set a reasonable default in the app before you land in India, and always have a backup physical card or two to use too. In any case for higher payment amounts you'll need to have a physical card on hand (e.g., hotel bills) as usually contactless is rejected above some threshold.