RBI doubles Prepaid Payment Instruments limit to Rs 20,000

With the public facing cash crunch, RBI today introduced special dispensation for small merchants and doubled the limit of semi-closed Prepaid Payment Instruments (PPIs) to Rs 20,000 to facilitate digital transactions.
To meet the transactional needs of the public through digital means, RBI has introduced additional measures by way of special dispensation for small merchants and enhancement in limits for semi-closed PPIs.
A special dispensation has now been enabled for small merchants whereby the issuers can issue PPIs to such merchants, the central bank said.
While balance in such PPIs cannot exceed Rs 20,000 at any point of time, the merchants can transfer funds from such PPIs to their own linked bank accounts up to Rs 50,000 per month, without any limit per transaction.

Merchants only need to provide a self-declaration in respect of their status and details of their bank accounts.
"The limit of semi-closed PPIs issued with minimum details has been enhanced to Rs 20,000 from the existing Rs 10,000. The total value of reloads during any given month has also been enhanced to Rs 20,000," RBI said.

Full KYC PPIs with balance up to Rs 1,00,000 can continue to be made available by authorised PPI issuers, it added.
The measures will be effective November 21 till December 30.
The earlier PPI guidelines did not specifically provide for opening of PPIs for such merchants as a separate category and the limit for semi-closed PPIs issued with minimum details was Rs 10,000.