NPCI (National Payments Corporation of India) as a public sector company managing retail payments and settlements in India recently announced new UPI transaction ID rules that begin at February 1 2025.
The new regulation sets a rule that blacklists UPI transaction IDs which use special characters including #, @, $ or * in their identifiers. Starting from February 1, 2025 UPI payment apps must cease their practice of generating transaction IDs with special characters. UPI apps employing special characters in their transaction IDs will experience failed central system approvals for all such transactions.
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The National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) released a circular on January 9 through which it demanded UPI ecosystem players to adopt alphanumeric character systems for UPI transaction ID production. The requirement exists to satisfy UPI technical requirements.
The requirements for specifications’ fulfillment have led to implementing a rule that bans all special characters from being included in UPI transaction IDs. The central system will deny all payments that use special characters within their ID. This shall be effective 1 February 2025.

All entities need to take note of these measures as they must follow the specified requirements. The contents within this communication need to reach all necessary parties so they can take required action.
What Are the Special Characters?
The standard 26-letter alphabet and numerical range from 0 to 9 does not include special characters. The group of special characters consists of punctuation marks as well as accent marks together with various symbols.
UPI Transaction & Share In Digital Payments India
The RBI’s payment system report indicates that UPI’s share of India’s digital payments rose from 34 percent in 2019 to 83 percent in 2024 as the technology achieved a 74 percent CAGR during the five-year period.
During this same period the report shows digital payments volume using RTGS, NEFT, IMPS, credit cards, debit cards, etc. decreased from 66 to 17 percent.
The report identifies UPI as the main force behind Indian digital payment expansion because users find it helpful and straightforward to operate.
The usage of UPI transactions expanded from 375 crore in 2018 to 17,221 crore in 2024 while transaction values rose from ₹5.86 lakh crore in 2018 to ₹246.83 lakh crore in 2024.
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