By skyforbes 
ChatGPT can now use UPI for payments
India has quietly taken a major step in digital payments. The National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI), Razorpay, and OpenAI have launched a pilot program to enable UPI payments directly inside ChatGPT.
For the first time, you could have a full shopping experience, product discovery, comparison, and payment, without ever leaving a conversation. BigBasket is part of the pilot, with Axis Bank and Airtel Payments Bank as banking partners.
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This isn’t just a convenience upgrade. It’s the start of a new way to think about money, AI, and commerce.
How It Works
In simple terms: you chat, the AI searches, suggests, and executes.
- Ask ChatGPT for a product, like “Order my weekly groceries and add 5 Lays Magic Masala.”
- The AI checks availability, compares prices, and presents options.
- You confirm, and the payment goes through UPI seamlessly, all inside the chat interface.
No app switching, no QR codes, no manual PIN typing. Just intent → action → payment.
Why This Matters
Its a big leap for sure
- Mature Payment Infrastructure: India’s UPI network, backed by Aadhaar and account aggregators, is robust enough to handle real-time payments inside AI conversations securely.
- Agentic Commerce: Razorpay calls this “Agentic Payments.” AI doesn’t just assist,it acts on your behalf. ChatGPT can become your personal shopping agent.
- Frictionless Experience: The future of payments isn’t faster transactions; it’s invisible transactions. You get what you want without thinking about the steps in between.
- Convergence of AI and Fintech: Chatbots are no longer just discovery tools. They can now handle the end-to-end commerce workflow, merging conversation and transaction in a single interface.
Impacts
- For Users: Huge convenience. One interface for discovery, comparison, and purchase. Less cognitive load. Fewer apps to juggle.
- For Merchants: Direct access to AI-driven buying decisions. BigBasket can target users more efficiently inside ChatGPT.
- For Banks and Fintech: New avenues for transaction volume, user engagement, and data insights.
- For the Economy: Signals that India’s digital payments infrastructure is ready for more complex, real-time, AI-driven financial interactions.
Challenges and Problems
- Security Concerns: UPI is secure, but AI handling payments autonomously adds a new attack surface. Mistakes or hacks could have financial consequences.
- User Trust: Will users feel comfortable letting AI handle payments without manual verification every time? Adoption could be slow initially.
- Technical Complexity: Integrating multiple systems,AI, merchant inventory, banking rails, and UPI, without errors is non-trivial.
- Regulation and Compliance: Agentic payments may fall into a grey area of fintech regulation. NPCI and banks will need to ensure compliance with existing laws.
The Future
If the pilot succeeds, we could see:
- Expanded Merchant Network: More e-commerce platforms and service providers integrating directly into AI interfaces.
- Personalized Finance Agents: AI that remembers your preferences, recurring orders, and even budgeting constraints.
- Cross-Platform Payments: Beyond ChatGPT, this could become a standard in voice assistants, messaging apps, and IoT devices.
- New Commerce Models: Conversational, intent-driven shopping where the line between discovery and purchase disappears.
India might be the first to fully test this, but if it works, conversational commerce powered by AI and UPI could go global. The day when your AI agent orders, pays, and tracks everything for you may not be far off.