Vendors accuse HomeShop18 of fraud; PhonePe may partner with ICICI Bank for UPI-based transactions

Vendors of the teleshopping and ecommerce portal HomeShop18 say the company has failed to pay them. Bengaluru-based payments platform PhonePe may enter into a partnership with ICICI Bank to offer a unified payments interface(UPI)-based digital transactions to its customers. 

Vendors association approaches MCA as HomeShop18 allegedly commits Rs 200 crore fraud

Vendors of the teleshopping and ecommerce portal HomeShop18 have approached the Ministry of Corporate Affairs (MCA) and police for an alleged Rs 200 crore fraud by the portal, reports Entrackr.

Himanshu Khatter, president, HomeShop18 Vendors Association, reportedly said that the firm has not cleared the payments of about 150 sellers for the products sold to customers. The total is around Rs 200 crore. 

The firm was supposed to wire the money after deducting its average commission of 30% to sellers, Khatter said.

The association has drafted its complaint to MCA, economic offences wing (EOW) and the senior superintendent of police, Surajpur. It has also written to the President, Prime Minister, Finance Minister and the reserve bank of India, the report added.

PhonePe may partner with ICICI Bank for UPI-based transactions

Bengaluru-based payments platform PhonePe may enter into a partnership with ICICI Bank to offer unified payments interface(UPI)-based digital transactions to its customers, according to a report by The Economic Times.

If the deal goes through, customers onboarding onto PhonePe will be allotted ICICI Banks handle, the report said. Earlier, PhonePe offered UPI payments in partnership with Yes Bank through the @ybl handle.

The report revealed that this move might be a direct fall out of the mandate from the National Payments Corporation of India, (NPCI) which manages UPI payments in the country.

Amazon Pay to sell third-party insurance products

Amazon Pay India, the local digital payments arm of global ecommerce major Amazon is working with its investee firm ToneTag to integrate the latter’s sound wave technology to enable offline payments, according to a report by Entrackr. 

The digital payments arm of the retail giant is set to sell third-party insurance products, the report said.

The company is reportedly working towards offering insurance for the past few months. Entrackr, citing sources, reported that Amazon Pay has received the required approvals to aggregate third-party insurance products and has made a small team of 6-8 employees to look after the sub-vertical.

Amazon Pay has a corporate agency (composite) license from the Insurance Regulatory Development Authority (IRDA). Other license holders include Paytm Money, PolicyBazaar and LendingKart. All the firms are allowed to aggregate and promote insurance products under the license, the report added.

Over the past few years, Amazon has infused about Rs 2,900 crore into its payments unit. In the ongoing year, Amazon Pay had received close to Rs 600 crore from the parent entity.