Hyperlocal Fintech Network PayNearby Crosses Daily 1 Mn Transactions Mark

Mumbai-based PayNearby, a leading hyperlocal FinTech network, has achieved the milestone of daily 1 million transactions on its platform. This achievement goes hand in hand with the company’s mission to empower kiranastore owners, termed as ‘Digital Pradhans’, while facilitating mass scalefinancial inclusion in India. Since its inception in 2016, PayNearby has empowered over 527,239 retailers pan-India, enabling them to provide banking and financial services to over 4.28 crore citizens across the country.

Through its platform, PayNearby enables local retail stores to provide basic digital financial and non-financial services such as Aadhaar ATM, SMS Payment, EMI Collection, Khata Service, Prepaid Cards and soon activating Mutual Funds, small deposits& Insurance and UPI transactions amongst others. The company’s primary aim has been to enable assisted digital financial services to the masses which are tech oblivious. The company works on sachetizing, granularising and universalising the high end technology for benefit of the low income segments along with under banked or unbanked population.

With its roadmap for pre-calibrated relevant service offerings for this segment, PayNearby has made it possible for every person to utilise digital payments and banking services with ease at a nearby retailer by harnessing the new age contextual technology in an agile manner. Since this is usually carried out at the kirana store that they frequently visit, there is the added factor of trust when making the shift to this new mode of transactions and services.

Owing to the extent and scale of its ‘HarDukaan Digital Pradhan’ initiative, the platform trains its retailers to fulfil daily transactionsfor its Aadhaar Banking, Bill Payments, Card Not Present or SMS payment, Domestic Money Remittance, EMI Collection, Financing Retailers, Gold, HyperLocal, Insurance (ABCDEFGHI) services. It has recorded Domestic Money Transfer (DMT) of INR 1,437 crores and AEPS (Aadhaar ATM) monthly transactions of INR 2,686crores, further indicating the acceptance and usage of digital services across the country.

[caption id="attachment_130877" align="alignleft" width="400"] Anand Kumar Bajaj -Founder & CEO PayNearby[/caption]

Speaking on the milestone Anand Kumar Bajaj, Founder and CEO, PayNearby said,“We are delighted to have crossed the mark of 1 million transactions. This is a proud moment for us at PayNearby. It has been our aim to empower local retailers across the country, especially in Tier 2 and Tier 3 cities, to leverage technology for a smoother and simpler renditionof banking and financial services to the tech oblivious segment.

Over the course of its existence, PayNearby has been addressing the need-gap towards financial inclusion in the country through its array of financial services and extensively expanding network. We are confident that we are heading in the right direction in order to fulfil our goal of growing this network to include 50-lakh retail partners to digitally and financially empower the common man."

Incepted in April 2016 by Anand Kumar Bajaj, Subhash Kumar, Yashwant Lodha & Rajesh Jha, PayNearby is a robust digital fintech company which offers digital financial/non-financial services to locals. It is registered under the Startup India initiative of the Department of Industrial Policy & Promotion (DIPP), Government of India. PayNearby works on a B2B2C model and facilitates a bouquet of financial services including aadhaar banking, domestic remittances, bill payments, card payments, granular investment and insurance assurance among others.

Since its inception, PayNearby has been significantly contributing towards the ‘Digital India’ movement by simplifying access to digital financial services for the masses via its network of ‘Digital Pradhans’. Crossing 1 million transactions marks another significant step towards the company’s goal of creating the world’s largest hyperlocal FinTech network in India.

The startup has numerous technological tie-ups with financial institutions including YES Bank, RBL Bank, ICICI Bank, State Bank of India, Axis Bank, CC Avenue, Bill Desk, NPCI, FASTag, NBFC and FMCG companies. It is also the sole technology provider for using Aadhaar Enabled Payment Services (AEPS) and IMPS to YES Bank, making them one of the only two fintech companies hosted by the National Payments Corporation of India (NCPI).

FreeCharge Partners With Payment Solution Provider Paynear to Add 15,000 Merchants to Its Portfolio

FreeCharge, Indian digital payments platform, today announced its partnership with Hyderabad based payment solution provider Paynear. The partnership will extend FreeCharge’s acceptance to another 15,000 merchants across 22 states in India.

All 15,000 small scale merchants and individual shop owners using Paynear solutions can now accept payments using FreeCharge. With this association, many more outlets across India covering categories like retail, hospitality, food & beverage, pharma, health and beauty and many other business verticals will now accept FreeCharge.

Paynear provides mPOS solution to small scale merchants - grocery shops, pharmacy etc through an mPOS reader to the merchant and an mPay app. Using the same, merchants can accept payments using wallets, DC/CC and in EMI.

With the arrangement with FreeCharge, customers can use their mobile phones to make payments and complete the transaction with a secure On-The-Go-Pin in less than 10 seconds. The advantage of On-the-go pin is that payment can be made using FreeCharge even in absence of internet and telecom connectivity.

FreeCharge already has a huge merchant base including leading retail chains like McDonalds, Barista, Café Coffee Day, Hypercity, Vishal Megamart, Pantaloons, Shoppers stop etc. Additionally, several smaller merchants including grocery stores, pharmacies, kirana stores accept payment using FreeCharge. The partnership with Paynear will fuel the growth of these smaller merchants which form the backbone of Indian retail sector.

Commenting on the partnership, Sudeep Tandon, Chief Business Officer, Freecharge, said, “The partnership will help FreeCharge in reaching out to SMEs and individual businesses and strengthening its presence further in the retail domain. We are pleased to partner with Paynear and hope to offer a better shopping experience to their customers through our innovations and solutions.”

Commenting on the partnership, Priti Shah, Chief Executive Officer, PAYNEAR, said, “We are elated to partner with FreeCharge to enable all our merchants with their services on our Omni-Channel platform and will enable FreeCharge on both our online and offline merchants. With this facility all our present and future merchants would enjoy a seamless, cashless experience while accepting FreeCharge.”