FACE membership grows fourfold to 275 a year after SRO recognition

The Fintech Association for Consumer Empowerment (FACE), India’s first self-regulatory organisation for the fintech (SRO-FT) sector, has grown to about 275 members in August 2025 from just 60 in August last year.

 

The association marked its one year of recognition by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) last month.

 

Since then, the SRO-FT has expanded its scope beyond digital lending. It also includes members from across the fintech ecosystem, such as payments, peer-to-peer (P2P) lending, account aggregators, and regtech firms.

 

“The transition has been from a narrow digital lending focus to broader fintech space. We are at nearly 275 members from 60 last year. Getting a mixed membership that is representative of the industry, where there are both small and large players together, has been a focus area,” said Sugandh Saxena, chief executive officer (CEO), FACE.

 

She said the association offered complimentary memberships to smaller entities to experience the benefits and ensure their inclusion in the SRO-FT.

 

An SRO is a non-governmental organisation (NGO) that acts as a bridge between industry players and regulators, setting standards for the conduct of entities operating in the country.

 

FACE has mapped out around 1,000 to 1,500 entities that are in the fintech and techfin (companies providing digital infrastructure services to financial services companies) domain.

 

It has plans to add about 75 per cent of these entities as members of FACE in the next three years.

 

One of the evolving areas for FACE includes inclusion of artificial intelligence (AI) companies in the fintech and banking, financial services and insurance (BFSI) sector.

 

Oversight and enforcement

 

Saxena said that the association had strengthened its structure for oversight.

 

“We now have a very clear workable structure for oversight. We systematically look at market intelligence, print and social media monitoring, and complaints that we receive from stakeholders including our members,” she added.

 

While she did not disclose the number of non-compliance cases, she noted that FACE monitoring has led companies to correct their practices.

 

“There were a few cases where companies were following something which was not in line with the regulatory direction or expectation. We reached out to them, clarified and after discussion, such entities agreed that they will change their practice. They gave us evidence that they have changed it,” she said.

 

As a representative body for fintechs, she said that FACE needs constant engagement with the regulator to clear any confusion related to a specific policy or issues with interpretation of norms.

 

“We have a close engagement with the fintech department in terms of taking guidance and  understanding their priorities and expectations from the sector such as inclusion, innovation, cyber security and customer protection, among others.

 

Structured reporting happens, but beyond that we engage on a regular basis on industry matters, provide them with inputs and vice versa,” she added.