4 ms·

I really hope cash transactions become a little more normalised in India. The UPI experience is built for a single audience in mind. It has changed the way peo

by gsa 2mo ago

I really hope cash transactions become a little more normalised in India. The UPI experience is built for a single audience in mind. It has changed the way people transact in India but at the same time it's been an absolute nightmare for a tourist to play along. The only route for a tourist to use UPI is via third party apps, which charge a markup for loading money (3%). But let's say you accept that as a part of travelling - the limitation of tourist wallets is that they can't be utilised for P2P payments - exactly what UPI is most used for across the country. Alternative, since no one accepts cash anymore, is that I have to carry thick wads of cash so I can hand out exact change. That still gets you the stink eye because most vendors don't like to deal with cash anymore.

edflsafoiewq 2mo ago
Sounds like it would be easier to hope for a better UPI experience for tourists.
umeshunni 2mo ago
> it's been an absolute nightmare for a tourist to play along. But the solution to this should be to simplify the tourist experience and to allow payments from foreign banks and cards. Traveling to China has a huge hassle in the late 2010s due to everyone local switching to WeChat/Alipay but it not being available for tourists, but in the last few years (I last visited in 2023), you could use WeChat/Alipay with a non-China bank card.
- chinagenie_ai 2mo ago
  [flagged]
bix6 2mo ago
In 2026, you think cash could become more common instead of less? There is no way that happens unless they jack the fee up and even then…
thesimon 2mo ago
> the limitation of tourist wallets is that they can't be utilised for P2P payments - exactly what UPI is most used for across the country Same issue in a lot of Southeast Asia. After jumping through all hoops to get the correct app, id verified and paying a hefty fee, it was still a gamble if the restaurants would have a business QR code or a personal one. One time in Laos I was on an island that didn't have an ATM, almost no cards were accepted and I had run out of local currency. So I ended up asking for the QR code before ordering at the restaurant to make sure it would work out. In India it's super annoying when taking autos because the drivers won't have change and in 99% of the cases they have a personal code. So I just ended up using Uber with credit card, much less hassle. I don't know, central banks seem super afraid of money laundering somehow. But just allow me to spend $100 or what, I just want to buy a quick coffee or a fruit from a street vendor, not a Rolex.
sieve 2mo ago
> P2P payments Some P2P is between family/friends. Or you are paying rent etc. But a lot of it is business transactions that move funds from one savings account to another because the auto driver is accepting a payment in his mother's or wife's account or something similar. There is so much friction in the banking system if you have to create a current account that this is pretty common. The system needs to improve drastically to support the two sides instead of letting it be. Should help your use case as well if that happens
alephnerd 2mo ago
> it's been an absolute nightmare for a tourist to play along. The only route for a tourist to use UPI is via third party apps An NRI account with PhonePe is good enough as someone with OCI, but even in my ancestral town and village Visa and AmEx adoption by payment processors has been high despite no real diaspora or tourism. And there's no real point in optimizing for the kind of tourist who's going to go visit a slum like Paharganj or go to Kasol to partake in drugs. That said, I guess it also depends on where an NRI or PIO is from as some states have better payment processor penetration than others. But tbf, when my SO and I go to VN to visit family, it's the same story there (Momo/Zalo and cash rule Vietnam outside the tourist bubble of D1/D3/Thao Dien/Da Lat/Da Nang/Hanoi and we resort to her Vietcombank account).
- decimalenough 2mo ago
  Not being able to pay for things is a pretty fundamental problem even for a business traveler to Bangalore. Last time I bit the bullet and set up Mony, which at least got me access to UPI, but it's limited mostly by government policy: you can't complete the KYC process until you've physically landed in India, can't transfer to personal accounts, fees on adding money, fees on keeping money (they charge "unused balance" fees!), etc.
  - alephnerd 2mo ago
    > Not being able to pay for things is a pretty fundamental problem even for a business traveler to Bangalore In what situation were you as a foreign traveler where you needed to pay UPI? Convenience stores and hypermarts like Reliance SMART/Digital and DMart or QuickCommerce platforms like Blinkit accept Visa and AmEx credit cards. Transit via Uber, Ola, and co accept Visa and AmEx credit cards. And most restaurants and bars targeted at outsiders accept Visa and AmEx credit cards. And Hotels accept Visa and AmEx credit cards or can be booked via platforms that accept them like AirBnB. So transit, residence, restaurants, and convenience stores (all of which will be reimbursed by your employer) are all doable via credit card. Fundamentally, UPI was built for India3, as were other peers across Asia, not foreigners. But my SO and I never understood the tay ba lo mindset. Catering to them is what kept Thailand and the Dominican Republic stuck in tourism-induced Dutch disease because it incentivizes extractive and low productivity economic sectors like real estate and low skill services at the expense of human capital development and investing in high productivity industries.
KaiserPro 2mo ago
I mean this sounds like an edgecase, which is good tradeoff for the ~billion of people who this system is designed for. Essentially UPI was there to stop the industrial fraud and money laundering that was going on india. I have not actually checked the efficacy of this though. The last time I checked was when modi made the largest bank note not legal tender. That part aside it does sounds like VAT (a 20% sales tax on all purchases) but for transactions.
- kelipso 2mo ago
  It affects everyone who visits India, so it's not really an edge case. I'm sure there are plenty of towns in India that is primarily tourism-based.
  - KaiserPro 2mo ago
    Ok I get that, but 9 million people a year is less than 0.1% of the population. so they wouldn’t even show up in p99 stats.
    - dgellow 2mo ago
      For something as sensitive as a payment system you need to go way further than p99. Like way, way further
      - KaiserPro 2mo ago
        for reliability, sure, for fraud, also. But making sure that tourists don't pay a 3% charge, and/or can't do p2p? naaa. thats deliberate. tourists are rich, generally, and can be a rich source of money laundering options.
    - deleted 2mo ago
      [deleted]
glitchc 2mo ago
> The only route for a tourist to use UPI is via third party apps, which charge a markup for loading money (3%). Or a credit card.
mlmonkey 2mo ago
> which charge a markup for loading money (3%). .... the markup being what the credit card companies charge them.
conradfr 2mo ago
Don't visit India, problem solved.
darth_avocado 2mo ago
Is this a common experience now? I haven’t been there in a while, but one used to be able to use credit cards at bigger establishments and smaller vendors used to accept cash even if UPI was advertised in their shop. Rarely was anyone mad that you didn’t use UPI.
- HaloZero 2mo ago
  No vendor will say no to cash but having the right small change becomes a PITA in my experience but that was 3 years ago. But even the coconut guy on the corner had a QR code.
TitaRusell 2mo ago
UPI is not perfect but me as a white piggu tourist handling monopoly money isn't much better.
paxys 2mo ago
So a country of a billion+ people should reverse its very successful digitization efforts because a handful of tourists can’t be bothered to pay a small surcharge? Smaller, in fact, than what they pay in their own country for credit card fees.
- fy20 2mo ago
  This issue isn't the surcharge but there are still limitations to it. The commercial banks really need to do something like this themselves. Well they do, but last time I looked you needed to physically go to a branch, but not all branches do it - yeah I'm not going to spend half a day on my trip just to pay slightly easier. It needs to be something you can sign up in the airport in 10 minutes for. Every time I've been to India I just ended up finding an ATM (that works with my card) and carrying around massive wads of cash. I even stayed at a hotel once that couldn't take international cards.
- nonethewiser 2mo ago
  >The UPI experience is built for a single audience in mind. It has changed the way people transact in India but at the same time it's been an absolute nightmare for a tourist to play along. Indian built UPI for a single audience AKA their citizens
- wasfgwp 2mo ago
  Governments having absolute control on who can pay who and being able to easily restrict certain groups from participating in the economy is not ideal, though (of course currently tourists being the only group this applies to is not a big deal..)
- choudharism 2mo ago
  Read again, this time without whatever blinders you have on. Specifically after the "But let's say you accept that as a part of travelling..." part.
ssivark 2mo ago
If you're worried about the markup for loading your digital wallet, what is the markup for any tourist trying to get cash from eg. Thomas Cook? I doubt any tourist could get currency at a significantly cheaper rate.
ivell 2mo ago
Tourists can get prepaid UPI. https://www.npci.org.in/blog/upi-one-world-your-digital-passport-to-seamless-payments-in-india https://www.npci.org.in/blog/upi-one-world-your-digital-pass...
ktimespi 2mo ago
I think there are solutions to the UPI problem which are not whatever this is. Cash has been a huge pain point in India for a while now.
bubblethink 2mo ago
>it's been an absolute nightmare for a tourist Unfortunately, this cannot be fixed. India has a huge boner for papers, KYC, etc. The state isn't going to let you access payments and communication services without a colonoscopy.
- Cider9986 2mo ago
  What country doesn't? I hope more people learn about Monero.

by gsa 2mo ago

edflsafoiewq 2mo ago

Sounds like it would be easier to hope for a better UPI experience for tourists.

umeshunni 2mo ago

> it's been an absolute nightmare for a tourist to play along. But the solution to this should be to simplify the tourist experience and to allow payments from foreign banks and cards. Traveling to China has a huge hassle in the late 2010s due to everyone local switching to WeChat/Alipay but it not being available for tourists, but in the last few years (I last visited in 2023), you could use WeChat/Alipay with a non-China bank card.

chinagenie_ai 2mo ago
[flagged]

bix6 2mo ago

In 2026, you think cash could become more common instead of less? There is no way that happens unless they jack the fee up and even then…

thesimon 2mo ago

> the limitation of tourist wallets is that they can't be utilised for P2P payments - exactly what UPI is most used for across the country Same issue in a lot of Southeast Asia. After jumping through all hoops to get the correct app, id verified and paying a hefty fee, it was still a gamble if the restaurants would have a business QR code or a personal one. One time in Laos I was on an island that didn't have an ATM, almost no cards were accepted and I had run out of local currency. So I ended up asking for the QR code before ordering at the restaurant to make sure it would work out. In India it's super annoying when taking autos because the drivers won't have change and in 99% of the cases they have a personal code. So I just ended up using Uber with credit card, much less hassle. I don't know, central banks seem super afraid of money laundering somehow. But just allow me to spend $100 or what, I just want to buy a quick coffee or a fruit from a street vendor, not a Rolex.

sieve 2mo ago

> P2P payments Some P2P is between family/friends. Or you are paying rent etc. But a lot of it is business transactions that move funds from one savings account to another because the auto driver is accepting a payment in his mother's or wife's account or something similar. There is so much friction in the banking system if you have to create a current account that this is pretty common. The system needs to improve drastically to support the two sides instead of letting it be. Should help your use case as well if that happens

alephnerd 2mo ago

> it's been an absolute nightmare for a tourist to play along. The only route for a tourist to use UPI is via third party apps An NRI account with PhonePe is good enough as someone with OCI, but even in my ancestral town and village Visa and AmEx adoption by payment processors has been high despite no real diaspora or tourism. And there's no real point in optimizing for the kind of tourist who's going to go visit a slum like Paharganj or go to Kasol to partake in drugs. That said, I guess it also depends on where an NRI or PIO is from as some states have better payment processor penetration than others. But tbf, when my SO and I go to VN to visit family, it's the same story there (Momo/Zalo and cash rule Vietnam outside the tourist bubble of D1/D3/Thao Dien/Da Lat/Da Nang/Hanoi and we resort to her Vietcombank account).

decimalenough 2mo ago
Not being able to pay for things is a pretty fundamental problem even for a business traveler to Bangalore. Last time I bit the bullet and set up Mony, which at least got me access to UPI, but it's limited mostly by government policy: you can't complete the KYC process until you've physically landed in India, can't transfer to personal accounts, fees on adding money, fees on keeping money (they charge "unused balance" fees!), etc.
- alephnerd 2mo ago
  > Not being able to pay for things is a pretty fundamental problem even for a business traveler to Bangalore In what situation were you as a foreign traveler where you needed to pay UPI? Convenience stores and hypermarts like Reliance SMART/Digital and DMart or QuickCommerce platforms like Blinkit accept Visa and AmEx credit cards. Transit via Uber, Ola, and co accept Visa and AmEx credit cards. And most restaurants and bars targeted at outsiders accept Visa and AmEx credit cards. And Hotels accept Visa and AmEx credit cards or can be booked via platforms that accept them like AirBnB. So transit, residence, restaurants, and convenience stores (all of which will be reimbursed by your employer) are all doable via credit card. Fundamentally, UPI was built for India3, as were other peers across Asia, not foreigners. But my SO and I never understood the tay ba lo mindset. Catering to them is what kept Thailand and the Dominican Republic stuck in tourism-induced Dutch disease because it incentivizes extractive and low productivity economic sectors like real estate and low skill services at the expense of human capital development and investing in high productivity industries.

KaiserPro 2mo ago

I mean this sounds like an edgecase, which is good tradeoff for the ~billion of people who this system is designed for. Essentially UPI was there to stop the industrial fraud and money laundering that was going on india. I have not actually checked the efficacy of this though. The last time I checked was when modi made the largest bank note not legal tender. That part aside it does sounds like VAT (a 20% sales tax on all purchases) but for transactions.

kelipso 2mo ago
It affects everyone who visits India, so it's not really an edge case. I'm sure there are plenty of towns in India that is primarily tourism-based.
- KaiserPro 2mo ago
  Ok I get that, but 9 million people a year is less than 0.1% of the population. so they wouldn’t even show up in p99 stats.
  - dgellow 2mo ago
    For something as sensitive as a payment system you need to go way further than p99. Like way, way further
    - KaiserPro 2mo ago
      for reliability, sure, for fraud, also. But making sure that tourists don't pay a 3% charge, and/or can't do p2p? naaa. thats deliberate. tourists are rich, generally, and can be a rich source of money laundering options.
  - deleted 2mo ago
    [deleted]

glitchc 2mo ago

> The only route for a tourist to use UPI is via third party apps, which charge a markup for loading money (3%). Or a credit card.

mlmonkey 2mo ago

> which charge a markup for loading money (3%). .... the markup being what the credit card companies charge them.

conradfr 2mo ago

Don't visit India, problem solved.

darth_avocado 2mo ago

Is this a common experience now? I haven’t been there in a while, but one used to be able to use credit cards at bigger establishments and smaller vendors used to accept cash even if UPI was advertised in their shop. Rarely was anyone mad that you didn’t use UPI.

HaloZero 2mo ago
No vendor will say no to cash but having the right small change becomes a PITA in my experience but that was 3 years ago. But even the coconut guy on the corner had a QR code.

TitaRusell 2mo ago

UPI is not perfect but me as a white piggu tourist handling monopoly money isn't much better.

paxys 2mo ago

So a country of a billion+ people should reverse its very successful digitization efforts because a handful of tourists can’t be bothered to pay a small surcharge? Smaller, in fact, than what they pay in their own country for credit card fees.

fy20 2mo ago
This issue isn't the surcharge but there are still limitations to it. The commercial banks really need to do something like this themselves. Well they do, but last time I looked you needed to physically go to a branch, but not all branches do it - yeah I'm not going to spend half a day on my trip just to pay slightly easier. It needs to be something you can sign up in the airport in 10 minutes for. Every time I've been to India I just ended up finding an ATM (that works with my card) and carrying around massive wads of cash. I even stayed at a hotel once that couldn't take international cards.
nonethewiser 2mo ago
>The UPI experience is built for a single audience in mind. It has changed the way people transact in India but at the same time it's been an absolute nightmare for a tourist to play along. Indian built UPI for a single audience AKA their citizens
wasfgwp 2mo ago
Governments having absolute control on who can pay who and being able to easily restrict certain groups from participating in the economy is not ideal, though (of course currently tourists being the only group this applies to is not a big deal..)
choudharism 2mo ago
Read again, this time without whatever blinders you have on. Specifically after the "But let's say you accept that as a part of travelling..." part.

ssivark 2mo ago

If you're worried about the markup for loading your digital wallet, what is the markup for any tourist trying to get cash from eg. Thomas Cook? I doubt any tourist could get currency at a significantly cheaper rate.

ivell 2mo ago

Tourists can get prepaid UPI. https://www.npci.org.in/blog/upi-one-world-your-digital-passport-to-seamless-payments-in-india https://www.npci.org.in/blog/upi-one-world-your-digital-pass...

ktimespi 2mo ago

I think there are solutions to the UPI problem which are not whatever this is. Cash has been a huge pain point in India for a while now.

bubblethink 2mo ago

>it's been an absolute nightmare for a tourist Unfortunately, this cannot be fixed. India has a huge boner for papers, KYC, etc. The state isn't going to let you access payments and communication services without a colonoscopy.

Cider9986 2mo ago
What country doesn't? I hope more people learn about Monero.