Over 40% consumers in Tier 3-6 Cities use digital payments daily: Report

Over 40% of consumers in Tier 3 to 6 cities and towns of the country are using digital payment services on a daily basis. Also, over 45% of consumers are using digital payment services once every alternate day, according to a report by Chase India. The report titled ‘The State of Digital Payments in India’ based on sample survey of consumers and merchants in select Tier 3 to 6 locations, notes that consumers are using digital payments for making payments to varied stakeholders, including physical stores/shops (82%), online platforms (71%), and transfer of money to family/friends (72%). The survey reveals that on average, around 36% of merchants claimed to be processing over 50 digital payment transactions every month. Also, around 23% of merchants claimed to be processing not more than 1 digital payment transaction every alternate day.13 Furthermore, most merchants process digital payment transactions of less than Rs 15,000 every month. Only a handful of merchants claimed to process digital payments of over Rs 1 lakh. While around 41% of merchants claimed to receive less than 25% of their sales through digital payments, around 15% of merchants claimed to receive over 50% of their sales through digital payments. This shows the potential left to be tapped with respect to increasing the usage of digital payments at the grassroots level. Notably, PhonePe, Google Pay, Paytm, and BharatPe were found to be most popular service providers for digital payments amongst merchants.