Debit cards usage has surged 2.5 times, thanks to cash crunch

Before the demonetisation scheme, there were 71 crore debit card in India but only 13 crore debit transactions use to take place in a month with several account holders not using their card even once for payments. The average usage of deboit cards stood at 2.2 times/year.

Out of the 30 crore RuPay cardholders, 29 crore have never used their card in point of sales (PoS), or card swipe, machines.

Post Narendra Modi’s demonetisation, use of RuPay debit cards has since surged 2.5 times, and some banks have even seen a four-fold spike.

The government announced that until December end, all public sector banks and some private banks have waived the merchant discount rate on debit cards and also asked banks to install more PoS terminals.

According to IndiaMART -a B2B marketplace -there has been a surge in number of enquires for card swiping machines, which reflects a 2,000% surge in demand.