PayPal's Xoom, an international money transfer service, has integrated with NPIL's/NPCI's Unified Payments Interface (UPI) to offer inter-bank transactions in India, according to a press release.
The release stated using Xoom to send money is easier as the overseas senders only need to know a receiver's UPI identity to send the money, which can happen instantly anytime.
With UPI, money transfers can be set up without having to share bank details or source, using a virtual payment address instead of the usual bank account numbers or Indian Financial System Code (IFSC). In addition, recipients of money transfers will have the option to link several bank accounts and set their default bank account for transactions.
Xoom customers have the option of sending money to 66 banks in India, including leading banks like State Bank of India, ICICI Bank, Punjab National Bank, Andhra, Bank of Baroda, Bank of India, Indian Bank, Axis Bank, Canara Bank, Yes Bank, Kotak Mahindra Bank and Federal Bank, according to the release.
Julian King, vice president and general manager of Xoom, said real-time payments have been a "critical and essential payment tool" for the nine months of the pandemic thus far, and they have proved popular with customers in India.
"India is an important market for us," he said, according to the release. "We are delighted that Indian diaspora across many markets can now use UPI to send remittances back their loved ones back home with Xoom."
PayPal has been working to boost Xoom's money transfer capabilities, according to PYMNTS. In November, the company expanded the service to let U.S. residents send money directly to the bank account of a recipient. That move worked to boost payment capabilities during the pandemic, which has dealt a blow to the usual remittance process of physically standing in a line in order to send money.
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