Cashfree introduces ‘Instant Settlements’, makes online payments as attractive as cash

Bangalore: Cashfree, India’s leading business payments platform, has launched the ‘Instant Settlements’ feature for faster settlements and improved cash flow for businesses. The feature allows businesses to reduce the usual T+3 (Transaction date + Number of business days) settlement cycle and to access funds within 15 minutes of capturing the payment, even on bank holidays. The introduction of instant settlements removes the time gap between payments capture and fund accessibility, making it a lucrative offering for businesses.

Cashfree’s ‘Instant Settlements’ feature is in line with the RBI’s proposal to make 24×7 availability of NEFT infrastructure a reality. As part of the company’s expansion plan, Cashfree will soon extend the ‘Instant Settlement’ facility to its other collection products, including auto-collect and marketplace settlement. In 2019, Cashfree had pioneered ‘Instant Refunds’ in India and introduced ‘Same-day Settlements’ for businesses.

Akash Sinha, Co-Founder and CEO of Cashfree said, “While SMBs are thriving in India, there is a lot of hesitation to join the digital bandwagon due to delays in payment settlements and restricted cash flow. Better liquidity is essential for these small and medium businesses to keep pace in the era of digital India.

In a bid to ease the process of payments and settlements, we have introduced an innovative feature, ‘Instant Settlements’. We see this as a step to incentivize businesses that operate responsibly with consumers and have good credibility. ‘Instant Settlements’ will empower the gig economy, e-commerce sector and several other businesses by making digital payments an attractive option, at par with cash. We have been piloting the feature with a small set of users and expect to disburse 300-500 crores per month.”

Making online payments as attractive as cash

Delay in payment settlements is one of the key reasons that hinder businesses from moving towards the digital payment system. This feature allows companies to eliminate the delay in payments. Wherever inventory is involved, businesses can use the same funds to replenish the inventory and increase the volume of the existing stock, with reduced dependency on any credit line.

Instant Settlements will be available for all existing as well as new Cashfree payments gateway users, subject to evaluation of creditworthiness and other parameters.

2019 was a year of great growth for Cashfree which saw 1000% increase in transactions volume and over 1 million transactions processed a day.