The Paypers

According to Inc42, currently, a person can make contactless payments worth approximately USD 26 through the ‘tap-and-go’ feature, any transaction above that requires a PIN number. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, financial services wish the limit to be relaxed around USD 66 to eliminate the requirement of handing over cards, while avoiding touching the swipe machine for a larger base of transactions, thus increasing the adoption of contactless payments. Therefore, Visa and Mastercard suggested alternatives like relaxing the limit to USD 40 or a temporary relaxation for six months.

Besides, Visa reported that several authorities, banks and networks in over 55 countries around the world including Europe, the UK, ME, and SA have already set higher transaction limits for contactless card payments, shifts made for supporting banks in their efforts to push digital transactions in a post-COVID-19 era.

In April 2020, the RBI had given green signal for Visa, Mastercard and the National Corporation of India (NCPI) to allow tap-and-go functionality on card payments, even for purchases above USD 26. However, the financial service providers had to activate a two-factor authentication process, which required a PIN number for transactions above USD 26, meaning that at the moment, it depends on banks and payment participants to bring changes to the payments infrastructure, Inc42 reported.

Visa, Mastercard request RBI relaxation on 'tap-and-go' payment limit