BE/RBI NOTE/38/2018
Mobile wallet companies submit monthly status reports to RBI. This is being closely watched and monitored by Reserve Bank of India.
- RBI checks as to how many wallet users have created and how many of them have completed authentication or Know Your Customer formalities in line with the RBI directives.
- In an ecosystem users of mobile Wallets can be considered to be very low though one fourth of Wallet users have completed the KYC compliance which again is valid for 12 months.
- The conditions are:
- A full KYC compliance is complied with physical verification or a bio-metric check and
- A minimum KYC compliance can be done via mobile handset using an one time password.
- Further, RBI directives clearly mandates that:
- Mobile wallets with minimum customer details like a mobile and validated using a Government recognized identity proof is valid only for 12 months.
- Subsequent full KYC should be done, to keep the wallet active.
- Unlicensed entities’ mobile number based Aadhar authentication has been disable by UIDAI. This has resulted in completing the Customer Identification process difficult.
- Most of wallet companies do not have physical infrastructure to collect bio-metric details.
- They depend on mobile number based authentication for KYC compliance and the stoppage has handicapped them. Thus they are unable to even store the number for future reference.
Risk Factors:
- Mobile interoperability which is coming up soon is expected to increase the systemic risks .
- Thus timely compliance of KYC would be more essential.
- New regulatory limits will open new opportunities and it is for the Wallet companies to use these opportunities effectively.
