The NPCI has announced that from February 1, UPI transaction IDs should not contain special characters. Any transactions made through this medium that does not follow this rule will be rejected by the central system. This change has been made in order to increase the efficiency and security of UPI transaction processes.
In a January 9 circular, the NPCI told the payment service providers to ensure compliance by using only alphanumeric characters in the transaction IDs. This directive is based on an earlier advisory issued in March 2024, which explained the technical specifications that are to be followed for UPI transactions.
This change takes place as the UPI transactions continue to break new records. The UPI transactions in December 2024 were 16.73 billion, 8% up from 15.48 billion in November. The overall value of the transactions also rose to ₹23.25 lakh crore from ₹21.55 lakh crore in the month before that.
The NPCI’s latest directive is anticipated to accelerate the transaction processing and decrease the chances of errors thereby improving the payment experience of the consumers. Payment service providers are now required to change their systems to meet the new regulation and prevent transaction failures. As UPI has emerged as the most popular mode of digital payment in India, it is crucial to maintain uniformity and security in the processing of transactions.
