PhonePe, may other payment apps hit in wake of Yes Bank crisis
Mumbai: As Yes Bank went into moratorium, many a digital payment platforms bore the brunt on Friday as transactions were disrupted, with PhonePe facing "long outage".
PhonePe, which depends exclusively on Yes Bank as its payment services provider (PSP), was down since the order was imposed and also had to suffer the more-than-friendly barbs of rival Paytm Payments Bank on Twitter.
Yes Bank was put under moratorium late Thursday evening, with several caps, including allowing depositors to withdraw only Rs 50,000 per account and a slew of others including not taking fresh liabilities.
This resulted in the bank being unable to render the services as a PSP, experts said.
Even late in the evening, PhonePe was yet to start the Unified Payments Interface services, for which it depends on Yes Bank.
"We sincerely regret the long outage. Our partner bank (Yes Bank) was placed under moratorium by RBI," its chief executive Sameer Nigam tweeted in the morning.
The troubles resulted in Paytm Payments Bank inviting PhonePe to its UPI platform through an open message on
Twitter with a prickly end note - "Let's get you back up, fast".
This was met with a quick retort from PhonePe.
"No point getting back up faster, if we have to desert our long-term partners when they're down. Form is temporary, class is permanent," it said.
Some users on the micro-blogging site said that half of India's payments systems are down because other apps beyond PhonePe were also affected. Yes Bank's annual report for FY19 said the bank handled 35 per cent of merchant transactions on UPI and 31 per cent of the overall UPI volumes.
NPCI's website gave out a list of 15 third-party apps including PhonePe which depend on Yes Bank as a PSP.
The names also include Airtel and Angel Broking.
There were also reports of the bank's own customers unable to access their accounts online and being forced to visit the branches.
Payment gateway Razorpay's chief executive Harshil Mathur said its core business remains unaffected, but there were minor disruptions in the auxiliary services, forcing the company to work with other banks for business continuity.
Its peer Instamojo's chief executive Sampad Swain said it is temporarily withholding payoffs to merchants having Yes Bank accounts to ensure no merchant funds get blocked.
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Heatwave scorches Odisha, Jharsuguda reels under 43.6 degrees C
Bhubaneswar (PTI): Heatwave conditions scorched Odisha on Tuesday, with the IMD forecasting that hot and humid conditions would continue in parts of the state.
The IMD’s Bhubaneswar centre said Balasore, Bhadrak, Jajpur, Kendrapara, Cuttack, Jagatsinghpur, Puri, Khurda, Nayagarh, Ganjam and Gajapati districts were likely to experience hot and humid conditions on April 22.
It also predicted thunderstorms accompanied by lightning and gusty surface winds in parts of Mayurbhanj, Keonjhar, Puri, Khurda, Nayagarh, Ganjam, Gajapati, Rayagada and Koraput, among others.
On Tuesday, 18 places across Odisha recorded maximum temperatures of 40 degrees Celsius or above. The industrial town of Jharsuguda was the hottest in the state at 43.6 degrees Celsius.
Sambalpur and Titlagarh recorded 42.5 degrees Celsius each, followed by Hirakud at 42.4 degrees, Bolangir at 42.2 degrees and Angul at 42.1 degrees.
The twin cities of Bhubaneswar and Cuttack recorded 37.9 degrees Celsius and 38.8 degrees Celsius, respectively, with relative humidity levels remaining above 70 per cent.
Meanwhile, the state government directed all district education officers to conduct a Summer Learning Programme for students till class 8 in government schools during the summer vacation.
Officials said students would be given practice assignments along with audio-visual learning content.
Subject-wise assignment sheets have been prepared, while related digital material will be shared through school parents' WhatsApp groups using a chatbot system, they said.
