Amazon Pay has announced two new features at the Global Fintech Festival. One is UPI Circle, a family payment solution, and secondly, an expansion of its payment system to smart devices.

The UPI Circle feature allows a primary account holder to add family members to a payment group. It is now enabling them to make UPI payments without needing their own bank account.

With UPI Circle, added members receive their own UPI ID or QR code and can make payments from a fund with pre-set spending limits controlled by the primary user.

The primary user can choose between a one-time approval for all transactions or require per-transaction authorisation. Payments made through the circle are PIN-less, and biometric authentication secures them.

In a separate initiative with the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI), Amazon Pay is also extending its payment ecosystem to smartwatches and other wearables.

This will enable secure “tap-and-go” payments from these devices, protected by device-level encryption and biometric authentication.

Girish Krishnan, Director of Payments & Merchant Services at Amazon Pay India, said the new features address the growing need for secure, family-managed digital payments.

Amazon Pay targets the UPI Circle service at household managers who oversee family payments. It is also aimed at dependents such as teenagers who do not have individual bank accounts.

Featured image by Freepik.