Google Pay: Advancing Payments, Credit, and Commerce in India
At Google Pay, our mission remains constant: making payments and commerce simple, fast, and reliable to unlock a brighter financial future for all Indians. In keeping with this, today we are announcing new updates designed to help build financial confidence for everyone, from reimagining everyday credit and empowering the next generation, to helping small businesses grow and thrive as digital-first enterprises.
Reimagining Everyday Credit with ‘Flex’
In India, while digital payments have become ubiquitous, transactional credit remains underpenetrated. We see an opportunity to simplify and reimagine this experience for the next generation of card users.
Introducing Flex by Google Pay, a UPI-powered, digital, co-branded credit card designed to simplify and elevate the entire card experience for India’s financial needs. With Flex, we’re making everyday credit as ubiquitous as UPI payments, offering a simplified experience that enables users to apply and receive their card within minutes, manage payments, earn and redeem reward points with every Flex transaction, and avail flexible repayment options seamlessly, all backed by the trusted and secure experience of the Google Pay app.
Built on the RuPay network, we are excited to launch this first in partnership with Axis Bank, introducing the Google Pay Flex Axis Bank Credit Card. We look forward to expanding Flex to more issuer partners very soon. Read more here.
Pocket Money: Financial Confidence for the Next Generation
As digital payments become the norm, we want to help the next generation develop financial confidence safely. Building on the UPI Circle feature, we are rolling out Pocket Money, enabling parents to grant their children access to digital payments with built-in supervision. Parents can do this through two flexible modes. Set a monthly limit of up to Rs. 15,000 that allows the child to spend independently within that boundary. Alternatively, they can choose to approve every transaction request initiated by the child.
While the child can pay independently, the parent retains oversight. Furthermore, the parent receives an instant notification for every transaction the child makes, ensuring they are always in the loop. Parents can track all transactions done by the child in their transaction history, and can also pause access to Pocket Money instantly from their own app. More details here.
Helping Small Businesses Grow Digitally
For the millions of small businesses on Google Pay, digitization goes beyond just accepting payments - it is about being discovered and growing their customer base. We are introducing new features to help merchants enhance their digital presence:
- Building Credibility with seamless Customer Ratings: Ratings and reviews play an important role for merchant businesses. We are making it easier for customers to rate their experience with Google Pay merchants directly after a transaction. These ratings will seamlessly sync to the merchant’s Google Maps listing, helping them build credibility and get discovered by new customers.
Simplified Ads: To help small businesses reach customers more seamlessly, we have launched a GenAI powered Google Ads experience within the Google Pay for Business app. It helps merchants instantly generate their own ad, preview it, and launch a campaign in minutes - allowing them to drive discoverability without needing complex marketing expertise.
Unwavering focus on Financial Safety
As consumers and merchants transact seamlessly in the digital world, trust remains the bedrock of every interaction. Last year alone, our systems on Google Pay averted financial fraud to the tune of ₹13,000 crore. Since October 2024, we’ve displayed 4.1 crore (41 million) warnings against transactions suspected to be potential scams, safeguarding users directly at the point of transaction.
Over the last few months, we have launched new efforts to stay ahead of bad actors:
- Preventing Screen-Sharing Scams: With Android, we recently launched a crucial defense against screen-sharing scams. For users on Android 11 and above, a prominent alert will now appear instantly if you attempt to open Google Pay while screen-sharing is active on a call with an unknown caller. This feature empowers users with a simple, one-tap option to immediately terminate the call, shielding them from potential fraud in that critical moment.
- AI-Powered Fraud Prevention: We have scaled our agentic AI chatbot within Google Pay Help to engage with users who report fraud incidents. This allows us to interview and get valuable feedback from users at scale to better understand the behavior of malicious actors. This approach has helped increase scam detection rates by 21% and ensures we can send timely prevention alerts to users.
As the ecosystem grows, we remain committed to consistent innovation and building trusted products to ensure that a brighter financial future is not just a possibility, but a reality for every Indian.
