HIGHLIGHTS
- Mi Pay is based on the Unified Payments Interface (UPI) technology.
- Users can pay bills for electricity, gas, telephone and even recharge their prepaid phone connections.
- Xiaomi is relying on ICICI Bank as the payment service provider.
After testing in beta program for a while, Xiaomi has finally announced the Mi Pay payments app in India. The app is based on UPI technology and will be available to download on the Mi Store app. The Mi Pay will only work with Xiaomi phones that run on MIUI for now. Xiaomi says that Mi Pay has been certified by National Payments Council of India (NPCI) and is a safe way to make digital payments.
As stated, Mi Pay is based on the Unified Payments Interface (UPI) - the same technology that Paytm and other payments apps use in India. Mi Pay will be exclusive to MIUI-based Xiaomi smartphone users and will offer smart integration features. Xiaomi says that Mi Pay's framework will be implemented within MIUI, which means the payment app will be closely integrated with MIUI. For consumers, this means that they can access several features of Mi Pay via the Contacts, Camera and SMS app or any other native MIUI app.
With Mi Pay, users will be able to make payments in a similar fashion to Paytm and other UPI-based payment apps. Users will be able to make payments to other Mi Pay users. They can also pay bills for electricity, gas, telephone and even recharge their prepaid phone connections. Some major services such as Assam Power, BEST Mumbai, BSES Rajdhani and Yamuna are supported by Mi Pay. Users can also pay bills for popular broadband services like Hathway, Asianet and Nextra Broadband. Users can also make payments via QR codes.
For now, Xiaomi is relying on ICICI Bank as the payment service provider. Xiaomi says that the data is stored on Indian servers and not on servers located in China. Mi Pay will be integrated deeply with Xiaomi phones and is expected to offer a seamless payment service for consumers. So far, Xiaomi hasn't commented on whether Mi Pay will be available for other Android or iOS phones.
To kick start Mi Pay's usage, Xiaomi is offering some great deals for Mi Pay users. Those who use Mi Pay after the launch will get a chance to win 100 units of Redmi Note 7 and 50 Mi LED TV 4A PRO 32.
The Mi Pay will face competition from popular payments services in India such as Paytm, PhonePe, MobiKwik and Google Pay. Mi Pay will also rival with WhatsApp's in-built payment service, which is also based on UPI.
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