Airtel Payments Bank is an Indian payments bank with its headquarters in

New Delhi New Delhi (, , ''Naī Dillī'') is the capital of India and a part of the National Capital Territory of Delhi (NCT). New Delhi is the seat of all three branches of the government of India, hosting the Rashtrapati Bhavan, Parliament Ho ...

. The company is a subsidiary of

Bharti Airtel Bharti Airtel Limited, commonly known as (d/b/a) Airtel, is an Indian multinational telecommunications services company based in New Delhi. It operates in 18 countries across South Asia and Africa, as well as the Channel Islands. Currently, ...

. On 5 January 2022, it was granted the scheduled bank status by

Reserve Bank of India The Reserve Bank of India, chiefly known as RBI, is India's central bank and regulatory body responsible for regulation of the Indian banking system. It is under the ownership of Ministry of Finance, Government of India. It is responsible f ...

under second schedule of RBI Act, 1934.

History

In 2015, eleven companies received In-principle approval from the

to set up Payments Bank under the guidelines for Licensing of Payments Bank. On 11 April 2016, Airtel Payments Bank became the first company to receive the Payments Bank license from the

under Section 22 (1) of the Banking Regulation Act, 1949. Airtel Payments Bank started with an 80:20 partnership between

and

Kotak Mahindra Bank Kotak may refer to: * Kotak (band), an Indonesian rock band * Kotak (surname), surname and people who bear it * Kotak Mahindra Bank, an Indian financial service firm * Kotak Securities, subsidiary of Kotak Mahindra Bank * Kotak, Iran (disambiguation ...

. Bharti Airtel launched Airtel Payments Bank in September 2016 and went live with its pilot project in

Rajasthan Rajasthan (; lit. 'Land of Kings') is a state in northern India. It covers or 10.4 per cent of India's total geographical area. It is the largest Indian state by area and the seventh largest by population. It is on India's northwestern s ...

in November 2016. It was launched nationally in January 2017 to support the cashless revolution promised by the

Government of India The Government of India (ISO: ; often abbreviated as GoI), known as the Union Government or Central Government but often simply as the Centre, is the national government of the Republic of India, a federal democracy located in South Asia, ...

. In August 2021, Kotak Mahindra sold its stake to

Bharti Enterprises Bharti Enterprises is an Indian multinational conglomerate, headquartered in Delhi. It was founded in 1976 by Sunil Mittal. Bharti Enterprises owns businesses spanning across manufacturing, telecommunications, agribusiness, real estate, ho ...

. As on 31 December 2021, 99.9% equity capital of the Bank is owned by the Bharti Group of Companies. The bank turned profitable in the quarter ended 30 September 2021, with an annual revenue run rate of Rs 1,000 crore.

Services

Airtel Payments Bank has 62 million users and serves them through its digital platform and a retail-based distribution network. The Bank has built a network of over 500,000 neighborhood banking points.

Digital payments

In September 2017, Airtel Payments Bank launched

UPI United Press International (UPI) is an American international news agency whose newswires, photo, news film, and audio services provided news material to thousands of newspapers, magazines, radio and television stations for most of the 20th c ...

enabled digital payments to facilitate secure digital payments. Customers need to link their bank accounts on

BHIM BHIM (Bharat Interface for Money) is an Indian mobile payment mobile app, app developed by the National Payments Corporation of India, National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI), based on the Unified Payments Interface, Unified Payments Int ...

before they can make UPI payments. For UPI-based payments and transfers, customers are not required to furnish their bank details to enable transactions. Airtel Money is a

digital wallet A digital wallet, also known as an e-wallet, is an electronic device, online service, or software program that allows one party to make electronic transactions with another party bartering digital currency units for goods and services. This can ...

by Airtel Payment Bank that allows users to make payments using "My Airtel app" or

USSD Unstructured Supplementary Service Data (USSD), sometimes referred to as "quick codes" or "feature codes", is a communications protocol used by GSM cellular telephones to communicate with the mobile network operator's computers. USSD can be used ...

. It also provides products like a savings account where customers can be onboarded digitally, adhering to video KYC norms.

FASTag

Airtel Payments Bank launched the issuance of FASTag in November 2019, offline and online.

Airtel Safe Pay

In 2021, The Bank launched ‘Airtel Safe Pay’ that provides an additional layer of payment validation compared to the industry norm of two-factor authentication.

Insurance and pension

In July 2019, Airtel Payments Bank partnered with Bharti AXA General Insurance. Airtel Payments Bank and Bharti Axa Life Insurance have started to provide the government's insurance plan Pradhan Mantri Jeevan Jyoti Bima Yojana in August 2018. In 2019, Airtel Payments Bank started offering Atal Pension Yojana (a

initiative) through its platform.

Remittance and AEPS service

Airtel Payments Bank’s total distribution reach is twice that of the total ATMs and bank branches in the country. Aadhaar enabled payment system is a segment, having Aadhaar-linked accounts of any bank, to do transactions at over 500 thousand banking points of the Airtel Payments Bank. It allows customers to carry out transactions by using their Aadhaar number or Virtual ID to access their bank accounts.

DigiGold

In May 2021, Airtel Payments Bank launched DigiGold, a digital platform for its customers to make investments in gold. DigiGold has been launched in partnership with SafeGold, a provider of digital gold.

Financials

The Bank's capital at its establishment was Rs 3,000 crore (US$441 million). In 2018–19, Airtel Payments Bank reported a loss of ₹338 crore, while it registered a loss of ₹272 crore in the financial year 2017–18. In FY 20, its revenues rose 87% to ₹474 crore. It turned profitable in the quarter ended September 2021 and has achieved an annual revenue run rate of Rs 1,000 crores. In December 2021, money deposited with Airtel Payments Bank surged 75 per cent to Rs 1,000 crore as compared to 2020. Total share capital infused till date is Rs 2,348 crores as per financials.

Legal challenges

The

Unique Identification Authority of India Aadhaar ( hi, आधार, ādhār, lit=base, foundation, bn, আধার) is a 12-digit unique identity number that can be obtained voluntarily by the citizens of India and resident foreign nationals who have spent over 182 days in twelve ...

(UIDAI) suspended

and Airtel Payment Bank's licence for eKYC of

Aadhar Aadhaar ( hi, आधार, ādhār, lit=base, foundation, bn, আধার) is a 12-digit unique identity number that can be obtained voluntarily by the citizens of India and resident foreign nationals who have spent over 182 days in twelv ...

on 16 December 2017, following complaints from customers that their accounts were being opened without their consent. Some even received their LPG subsidies in their Airtel Payment Bank accounts. However, on 12 July 2018, Airtel Payments Bank received requisite approvals from the Reserved Bank of India and

(UIDAI) to resume on-boarding new customers using of Aadhaar-based e-KYC.

References

{{Kotak Mahindra Bank Banks established in 2017 Payments banks Payment service providers Mobile payments Mobile payments in India Indian brands 2017 establishments in Delhi Financial services companies based in Delhi Companies based in New Delhi Private sector banks in India Bharti Airtel Kotak Mahindra Bank