Google Pay has implemented a convenience fee for bill payments made with credit and debit cards, according to The Economic Times.
A review conducted by The Economic Times highlighted an instance where a customer incurred a fee of nearly Rs15, labelled as a “convenience fee,” for paying an electricity bill using a credit card.
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This charge also encompassed GST and was alternatively termed a “processing fee for debit and credit card transactions.”
Google Pay’s official website confirms that the convenience fee on bill payments is applicable to card payments, whereas UPI transactions linked directly to bank accounts will continue to be free of charge.
The precise date when these fees were introduced remains unspecified.
The convenience fee introduced by Google Pay varies from 0.5% to 1% of the transaction value, in addition to the applicable GST.
This follows Google Pay’s previous move to impose a Rs3 convenience fee on mobile recharges, which began over a year ago.
Currently, Google Pay holds 37% of market share in India.
In December last year, Google initiated legal proceedings against the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) in the US, challenging the federal agency’s decision to supervise Google Pay.
The lawsuit, filed in the district court in Washington, DC, disputes the CFPB’s authority to regulate the electronic payment service.
This legal action comes in the wake of the CFPB’s declaration of its intent to exercise supervisory authority over Google Payment Corp, the payment division of Alphabet.
