RBI lifts ban on Razorpay, Cashfree; allows onboarding new merchants

livemint.com:

Mint. Cashfree Payments spokesperson said: “Securing the Payment Aggregator (PA) licence from the RBI is a pivotal moment for Cashfree Payments, affirming our focus on compliance and highlighting the significance of a well-regulated payments landscape. We are now onboarding new merchants on our payment gateway.

We are very excited about this new phase of our journey, where we continue to drive exponential growth and retain our market leadership as the preferred aggregator in the payments space." Razorpay spokesperson said: “Having received the new PA licence, we now restart onboarding new customers and are committed to serving them with our industry-first payment solutions. We welcome this new development and are delighted to be one of the first Payment Gateways to have received the final PA licence from the RBI." Last year, the central bank asked Razorpay, Cashfree, PayU, and Paytm, which hold in-principal approvals for payment aggregator licence, to stop on-boarding new merchants till they get the final licence. Paytm and PayU India are still awaiting clarification.

"We have resubmitted our application and are waiting for a decision," said PayU India. Paytm is yet to respond to Mint’s queries. Last year, RBI asked these aggregators to temporarily withhold onboarding new online merchants till additional documents are submitted.

The companies were in constant talks with the regulator ever since then. Razorpay, PayU India and Cashfree, according to one of the payment aggregator officials, earlier accounted for about 70-80% market share in terms of onboarding new merchant accounts. With top four out of action since last one year, new merchants have been going with some of the other aggressive players such as Infibeam