As a part of the COVID-19 pandemic, Mastercard, Axis Bank, Worldline launched a digital payment solution for kirana stores to spice up contactless payments within the country.
There are various techniques of digital payments like Bharat QR, sending payment links to customers, etc. and this enhances the payment methods so easily and rapidly to both the purchasers and merchants. Mastercard India a global payment technology company, has collaborated to launch a digital point-of-sale solution (Soft POS), to assist offline merchants and Kirana stores to accept payments using their smartphones. Axis Bank and Worldline India have also joined for this mode of digital payment to encourage contactless payments during this COVID-19 scenario.
Mastercard has also partnered with Zoho Corp, that cares about people holistically, for the advantages of the merchants with large turnovers to file their goods and services tax returns, among other services. Mastercard targets to line up 10 million small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in India by 2021 through distinct banking partnerships. Also, it plans to start this solution in South Asian markets including Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, and Nepal over the subsequent year.
Vikas Saraogi, vice president, South Asia, Mastercard mentioned that during the pandemic scenario it is very necessary for the merchants across the country for accepting cashless payments and supply the speed of transactions through a digital way. Mastercard has been working towards merchant and consumer education, development of low-cost payment acceptance solutions, and last-mile support for the merchants to start their digital onboarding. This facility is additionally planned to be launched in Southeast Asian markets including Thailand.
Now Mastercard has partnered with Axis Bank to on board new merchants with Soft POS. This will help the cardholder to tap their contactless card on the merchant smartphone with NFC to create a contactless digital payment.
Through the Soft POS, they’re looking to aim proprietary store owners which have a turnover of Rs. 10 lakhs to Rs. 50 lakhs. Axis Bank plans to develop the network of this solution to 15%-20% of its offline store distribution of its newly acquired merchants within the country. The app-based solution helps the banks to possess complete transparency of merchant’s transactions and also makes it easier for small merchants to desire business loans.
