Google Pay is the second biggest payment app in India with over 60 million active users. Also known as GPay, the application is best known for its UPI transactions on a P2M and P2P basis. It also supports bill payments and recharges for electricity, mobile, DTH, water, gas cylinders, and more.
In the latest news, Google Pay has started charging users a small convenience fee on mobile recharges. Earlier, the service was entirely free with no extra charges, and users were only required to pay the amount charged by the telecom operator. It looks like Google is now exploring ways to generate revenue from the multi-billion dollar digital payments ecosystem of India.
You Will Now Be Charged Extra for Mobile Recharges on Google Pay
A user named Ankush has reported that Google Pay has started charging extra convenience fees on mobile recharges. He noticed this after doing a Rs 749 Jio recharge on the Google Pay app where he was charged Rs 3 extra as convenience fees.
Ankush reported this problem on DesiDime forums and also clarified that he paid for the recharge using UPI. Hence, it is clear that the extra charge is not because of paying with a credit card where apps sometimes include a small surcharge as payment gateway fees.
Google Pay is charging its convenience fees in the following manner:
| Recharge Amount |
Convenience Charges (Extra)
|
| Up to Rs 100 | NIL |
| Rs 101 – 200 | Rs 1 |
| Rs 201-300 | Rs 2 |
| Rs 301 and above | Rs 3 |
The convenience fee is capped at Rs 3 for all recharges above Rs 301.
As of now, Google Pay is only charging these fees on mobile recharges, and other transactions such as electricity bill payments continue to remain free. UPI transactions for personal and merchant usage also remain free on Google Pay without any extra charges.
It is worth noting that Google Pay is not the first app to introduce convenience fees on mobile recharges. A few months back, PhonePe and PayTM were one of the first apps to start charging platform fees to the user for doing mobile and other recharges.
Google has not officially announced the new convenience fee change yet. However, we noticed that Google has quietly updated its Terms of Service for India on November 10, 2023. A term called Google Fees can now be spotted where Google specifically mentions that users may get charged a small fee for mobile recharge transactions.
We cannot confirm whether this change was brought with the recent policy update. But considering that the document was updated just last week, and we just witnessed a case of convenience fees today, it is highly possible that Google may have silently added this new clause to its service.
As of now, the new convenience fee is not visible to all users on Google Pay. The company could slowly roll out this change to all users in phases. If you wish to avoid these fees, then it is a good idea to recharge directly from the app or website of your particular telecom operator.
