Mumbai: The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) on Tuesday issued consolidated guidelines for e-mandates in digital payments, mandating an additional factor of authentication (AFA) to enhance the security of recurring transactions.
The new norms are applicable to all payment system providers and participants handling auto-debit payments across cards, prepaid payment instruments, and the Unified Payments Interface (UPI), covering both domestic and cross-border transactions. The directions have come into effect immediately.
Under the revised framework, customers opting for the e-mandate facility will have to complete a one-time registration process.
“The mandate will only be activated after successful validation of an additional authentication factor, over and above the standard verification process carried out by issuers,” RBI said.
The central bank also clarified that the first transaction under any e-mandate must mandatorily go through this additional authentication layer.
 on Tuesday issued consolidated guidelines for e-mandates in digital payments, mandating an additional factor of aut){kind=link}