Page 27 - Banking Finance July 2020

PRESS RELEASE

PhonePe sees over 150% growth in loan EMI repayments post lockdown

PhonePe, India’s leading digital payments platform, announced that it has seen over 150% growth in loan EMI repayments
category on its platform since March 2020 led by Bajaj Finance. It currently
has over 60 lenders integrated into its platform enabling its users to make
easy and timely repayment of loans at the click of a button and at no extra
charge. The platform has already tied up with some of the nation’s biggest
private non-banking lenders such as Bajaj Finance, Home Credit, Muthoot,
DMI Finance, HeroFinCorp, Tata Capital among others. It has thus become a comprehensive destination for all kinds of loan
repayment needs of its 200+ million users. The lenders include providers of microfinance, housing loans, consumer durable
loans and short term liquidity loans among others. The loan EMI repayment category provides users with the convenience
of making repayments at will or by setting up an auto-debit on a specified date.
Commenting on the development, Ankit Gaur, Head of Online Business, In-app Categories & Switch BD, PhonePe said, “We
have enabled the easy discovery of lenders with instant access to large players like Home Credit, Bajaj Finance etc. We
have kept the process user-friendly with just 4 steps to facilitate friction-free payments. We also don’t charge anything
extra to our users for making the loan repayment using our platform. Besides, the loan providers find our platform attractive
given our user base of 200+ million across the country and seamless technology integration at the backend. We are actively
working to expand our lender base to over 100 by the end of this year to cater to a larger number of users across the
country.”
Kurush Irani, President Credit Operations, Bajaj Finance said, “The sheer convenience and simplicity of usage for customers
making loan repayments on PhonePe is amply evident by the velocity it has generated for us in the 3 months of going live
in this space. Our partnership with PhonePe and BBPS ties up with our strategy of providing frictionless customer experience
while making missed payments and augmenting digital collections.”
PhonePe users can pay their loan EMIs in a few seconds with just four simple steps on the app. This includes selecting the
lender from the list, entering basic details such as loan account number, name of the borrower and mobile number before
making the payment using UPI, debit card or PhonePe wallet.

PhonePe partners with ICICI Bank on UPI Multi-Bank
PhonePe, India’s leading digital payments platform, announced that it has partnered with ICICI Bank on UPI multi-bank
model giving its users the option to create and use multiple UPI IDs with ICICI Bank’s “@ibl” handle and YES Bank’s
‘@ybl’ handle on the PhonePe app. This addition, in partnership with ICICI Bank, enables quick and contactless payments
to over 200 million registered PhonePe users.
For PhonePe, this is in line with the company’s philosophy of offering users and merchant partners a seamless transaction
flow. Collaborating with two banking partners will further strengthen the overall service reliability and uptime of PhonePe's
market leading UPI offering.
Commenting on the announcement, Hemant Gala, Vice President, Financial Services & Payments, PhonePe said, “At
PhonePe our effort has always been to give customers more choice while making their transaction experience seamless.
Offering the ‘@ibl’ handle to the users on our platform further solidifies PhonePe’s already fruitful association with ICICI
Bank. With customers now being able to choose between multiple handles for their UPI IDs, we have achieved another
key milestone in our journey towards making payments easy, secure and accessible to all.”

Talking about the partnership, Bijith Bhaskar, Head- Digital Channels & Partnership, ICICI Bank said, “With increase in
adoption of digital payments, ICICI Bank remains committed to extend its robust, reliable and scalable ICICI stack for
wider use to the customers and partners. In further deepening of its collaborative ecosystem, ICICI Bank is partnering
with PhonePe for extending UPI services. We believe that with this partnership both ICICI Bank and PhonePe would be
able to capitalise on their immense domain strengths for empowering customers to a seamless and simple digital payment
experience.”

BANKING FINANCE | JULY | 2020 | 27