FreeCharge looks at seven-fold growth in daily transactions by 2016-end

Snapdeal’s online payments platform FreeCharge is looking at a seven-fold growth in daily transactions to seven million by the end of 2016, as it plays catch-up with its larger rival, Paytm. Four months into the launch of its digital wallet, the company clocks one million transactions on a daily basis, according to FreeCharge’s chief Operating Officer Govind Rajan.

Paytm, which has 100 million active users for its digital wallet, is said to have 75 million daily transactions. FreeCharge claims it enables customers complete transactions within 10 seconds which, in turn, has led to 75 per cent of its users using the platform more than once.  While low-value prepaid mobile recharges make up for a majority of transactions on FreeCharge, bill payments constitute 20 per cent of transactions in terms of value.

“Online shopping is taking off, too. It's well on its way to becoming one of our largest use cases,” added Rajan. Snapdeal acquired FreeCharge in April last year in a deal valued at close to $500 million as it looked to build out its own payments and digital money platform.

Paytm, which started off as a digital payments player, launched its commerce platform and claims to be among the top three in terms of revenues.

There has been a massive push from all large e-commerce companies to control payments. Amazon had recently acquired Noida-based Emvantage Payments to provide its Indian customers with a better payment experience.

Flipkart, the country’s largest online marketplace, too, acquired digital payments company FX Mart in September last year, while ride-hailing company Ola has launched its own digital wallet Ola Money; the company has also invested in payment start-up ZipCash.