The National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) has rolled out new Unified Payments Interface (UPI) rules effective Friday, August 1, 2025, aimed at improving payment efficiency, reducing fraud, and ensuring smoother digital transactions. The regulations will apply to all UPI-enabled payment service providers such as Google Pay, PhonePe, and Paytm.
Key Changes in the New UPI Guidelines
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Balance Enquiry Limits – Users can check their bank balance up to 50 times a day. During peak hours, UPI apps may limit or pause balance enquiries to reduce system load. Account balance will now be displayed automatically after every transaction.
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Auto Payments – Recurring payments will only be processed in non-peak hours (before 10 am, 1–5 pm, after 9:30 pm). Missed payments will have retry options before being cancelled to avoid unnecessary transaction failures.
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Bank Details View Limit – Customers can view linked bank account details only 25 times a day, with requests initiated after selecting the issuer’s bank in the app. This move aims to curb unnecessary system queries.
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Transaction Status Checks – Pending payment status can be checked only three times, with a 90-second gap between each attempt, to reduce excessive load on UPI systems during high traffic periods.
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Recipient Name Display – The registered name of the recipient will be shown before every transaction to reduce the risk of sending money to the wrong account and to help prevent fraud.
The NPCI circular, issued on May 21, 2025, warns that non-compliance could lead to penalties, API restrictions, suspension of onboarding new users, or other disciplinary actions.
Digital payments via UPI have seen explosive growth in recent years, with millions of transactions processed every day. By introducing these new measures, NPCI aims to ensure that UPI remains stable, secure, and scalable even during festival seasons, salary credit days, and other high-volume transaction periods.
Industry experts believe these rules will help reduce failed transactions, improve payment success rates, and enhance user confidence in India’s most popular digital payment system.
