National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) on Wednesday said there is no charge for the bank account to bank account-based UPI payments or normal UPI payments.

However, interchange charges are only applicable for the prepaid payment instruments (PPI) merchant transactions and there is no charge to customers, NPCI clarified in a statement. 

NPCI has permitted the PPI wallets to be part of an interoperable UPI ecosystem and levied a 1.1 percent charge on unified payment interface (UPI) transactions above Rs 2,000 while using PPI.

"The interchange charges introduced are only applicable for the PPI merchant transactions and there is no charge to customers, and it is further clarified that there are no charges for the bank account to bank account-based UPI payments (i.e. normal UPI payments)," it said. 

With this addition to UPI, the customers will have the choice of using any bank account, RuPay Credit card and prepaid wallets on UPI-enabled apps, it said. 

In recent times, it said, UPI has emerged as the preferred mode of digital payment by offering a free, fast, secure and seamless experience. 

Traditionally, it said, the most preferred method of UPI transactions is linking the bank account in any UPI-enabled app for making payments which contributes over 99.9 per cent of total UPI transactions.

These bank account-to-account transactions continue to remain free for customers and merchants.