{
  "id": 4662115,
  "title": "Close to half the merchants not willing to pay MDR on UPI: Survey",
  "url": "https://urgent.news/2026/08/31/close-to-half-the-merchants-not-willing-to-pay-mdr-on-upi-survey",
  "topic": "business",
  "section": "Business",
  "published": "2026-08-31T13:35:16.000Z",
  "source": {
    "name": "YourStory",
    "slug": "yourstory",
    "url": "https://yourstory.com/2026/08/close-to-half-the-merchants-not-willing-to-pay-mdr-on-upi-survey"
  },
  "original_language": "en",
  "account": "A recent survey has found that nearly half of the country's merchants are unwilling to pay any charges on UPI transactions exceeding Rs 2000. According to the LocalCircles survey, 41% of the 32,796 merchants polled expressed this sentiment. The remaining 59% either do not accept UPI payments (9%) or would only bear minimal fees (33% would pay up to .25%). The Minimum Discount Rate (MDR) is a fee merchants pay to payment processors for accepting digital payments. This fee was applicable until December 2019, with a maximum of 0.3% of the transaction value. However, zero MDR was introduced in January 2020. LocalCircles posed the question, \"If you are a business that accepts UPI payments, what is the maximum MDR that you would be willing to bear on UPI payments above INR 2000?\" The most common response was 0% (41%), while other percentages ranged from 0.04% to 0.5%. Additionally, 9% of merchants stated they do not accept UPI payments at all. A separate survey revealed that 53% of UPI users would avoid using UPI for larger transactions if an MDR is imposed, with 27% preferring credit cards, 14% opting for debit cards, and 12% choosing cash or bank transfers. Only 12% would continue using UPI if they had to pay the fee, and 18% would only do so if the merchant absorbed the cost.",
  "summary": "LocalCircles surveyed 32,796 people across districts for this study. MDR is a fee paid by businesses to payment processors for accepting digital payments.",
  "key_points": [],
  "editors_take": null,
  "illustration": null,
  "coverage": {
    "outlets": 1,
    "also_reported_by": []
  },
  "ai_generated": true,
  "disclaimer": "Summaries, key points and the editor’s take are written by software from other outlets’ reporting and may contain errors — always check the linked original."
}