Mastercard, Axis Bank and Worldline launch Soft POS to addresses the needs of SMEs in COVID-19 times

Source: IBS Intelligence 2020-06-05

Mastercard, Axis Bank and Worldline launched Soft POS to become the first financial payments service in India to transform everyday smartphones into merchant Point of Sale terminals. The merchant community can start using Soft POS almost instantly as the online registration process with the acquiring bank takes less than 30 minutes. The white label solution is available to all banks and payment aggregators in the industry.

Vikas Saraogi, Vice President, Head of Acceptance, South Asia, Mastercard mentioned, “To support Digital India and the country’s evolution to a less cash society, Mastercard is delighted to partner with Axis Bank and Worldline in its journey to equip 10 million merchants with digital payments acceptance infrastructure by 2020-21. Given the current pandemic, an option of accepting cashless payments and the speed of transactions are paramount for small merchants across the country…”

The solution addresses the needs of small businesses, especially during the challenging times of COVID-19. The solution enables face-to-face payments with Bharat QR and NFC payments, as well as remote payments for home deliveries via link-based payments. The app also allows banks to have complete visibility of a merchant’s transactions, making it easier for small merchants to get business loans.

Sanjeev Moghe, Head- Cards & Payments, Axis Bank said, “…Announcing the launch of Soft POS, an innovative app specially designed for this community, is a step in that endeavor. Not only does this collaborative effort of Mastercard, Worldline and Axis Bank, open up a different channel for this community but also helps in penetrating the unexplored horizons of small ticket size merchants…”

Soft POS provides a cost-effective card acceptance solution for micro-merchants and SMEs in India. It eliminates the need to invest in a POS device. Merchants have an option to accept contactless payments directly via their own Android smartphones. This functionality is called “Tap on Phone” which means a cardholder can tap his/ her contactless card on the merchant Smart phone with NFC functionality and hence encourages social distancing.

Deepak Chandnani, Managing Director, Worldline, South Asia and Middle East stated, “…Soft POS will change the landscape of digital payments in India enabling millions of small merchants to accept all digital payments affordably. It has been built keeping in mind the needs and business practices of merchants in India with functionalities like “Khaata” built in. Soft POS is an example of combining technology with strategic vision to bring digital India to life…”

The application is available in eight languages and easily links with platforms such as Google Pay, WhatsApp Pay, Amazon Pay, amongst others.

Mastercard, Axis Bank and Worldline launch Soft POS to addresses the needs of SMEs in COVID-19 times

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