Average ticket size on UPI down 10% in H1 2023

The average ticket size (ATS) of all transactions on United Payments Interface (UPI) in H1 2023 was pegged at Rs 1,604, marking a 10 per cent decline, compared to Rs 1,774 in H1 2022, according to data from Worldline India's Digital Payments Report.

The reduction in the overall ATS on UPI is a good sign, suggesting a deeper embedding of UPI as it is being used for smaller or micro-transactions, and the dip is driven by the growth in person-to-merchant (P2M) transactions, the report said.

The ATS of P2M transactions dipped 21 per cent from Rs 839 in H1 2022 to Rs 659 in H1 2023.

However, on the person-to-person (P2P) front, ATS grew from Rs 2,442 to Rs 2,812, a 15 per cent increase during the same period.

Meanwhile, on the overall cards front, the ATS rose by 22.6 per cent to Rs 3,117 in H1 2023 from Rs 2,543.44 in H1 2022, aided by a strong year-on-year (Y-o-Y) growth in the ATS of debit cards.

Despite the drop in value and volume of transactions, the 18.3 per cent increase in the ATS of debit cards to Rs 2,303 in H1 2023 from Rs 1,947.5 in H1 2022 signals that debit cards are used by a significant number of the population, it said.

Meanwhile, credit cards' ATS was 9.1 per cent up to Rs 5,122.

However, at the same time, the prepaid cards' ATS decreased by 26 per cent to Rs 325 from Rs 440.26 in the year-ago period.

“Every passing month serves as a testament to the rapid adoption of digital payments.

"Looking back at the first half of 2023, I find myself even more optimistic about the payment trends unfolding in India; the impressive performance of UPI, the surge in credit card usage, the jump in mobile payments volume, and the uptick in small ticket size of P2M transactions,” Ramesh Narasimhan, CEO-India, Worldline, said.

The report added that the volume of P2P transactions surged from 18.62 billion transactions in H1 2022 to 22.75 billion in H1 2023, recording a 22 per cent rise in transaction volume.

In the same period, the value of P2P transactions shot up 41 per cent; from Rs 45.52 trillion to Rs 63.99 trillion.

The volume of P2M transactions marked a 119 per cent increase, growing from 13.33 billion to 29.15 billion in H1 2022 and H1 2023, respectively.

The value of these transactions grew 72 per cent from Rs 11.6 trillion to Rs 19.18 trillion in the same period.

Meanwhile, across the time period, the volume of debit card transactions stayed subdued at 1.379 billion, 28 per cent lower than volumes in H1 2022.

Similarly, the value of debit card transactions saw a 14.8 per cent fall to Rs 3.17 trillion from the year-ago period.

The reduction in debit card transactions is largely attributed to the increased use of UPI.

Mirroring the trend, the value of prepaid card transactions also fell by 32.8 per cent to Rs 325 billion due to both increased UPI transactions and guidelines by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) on prepaid cards released in June 2022.

However, the overall value of card transactions in H1 2023 stayed robust at Rs 11.35 trillion, registering an 11.7 per cent growth from H1 2022, which was largely supported by the value of transactions in credit cards.

The usage of credit cards to undertake higher-value transactions like white goods, travel, therefore, kept it unaffected.