Offering major relief to the mobile users as well as the mobile wallet companies, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has extended the last date for full know-your-customer (KYC) compliance by six months.
Prior to the extension, the deadline was February 28. The extension comes as a result of lobbying by mobile wallet firms and domestic internet groups with the central bank for the past few months.
User base of nearly 70-80 percent of e-wallet companies were yet to complete the full KYC norms. The users with incomplete KYC norms would have been invalid starting next month.
On the basis of RBI’s mandated circular issued in 2017, mobile wallet companies were largely focusing on Aadhaar foe e-KYC. But after Supreme Court’s verdict that barred private entities from using Aadhaar, it became tougher for companies to complete KYC.
This change in rule also inflated the cost per person in terms of e-KYC. While an e-KYC earlier costed on average about Rs 15 per person, the physical route will inflate it to Rs 80-100.
The earlier process was performed on the basis of an OTP send to the user’s mobile number, it now requires to be done physically by involving submission of several ID and address proofs.
