CityCash CEO speaks to Republic; Reveals how ‘Tap-to-Pay cards’ will make wallets

One cannot fail to mention the personal finance and banking sector when talking about startups’ impact, with FinTech being one of the most disruptive trends over the last 2 decades. Not long ago people had to physically visit banks for money transactions but now things have changed. ATMs, Net Banking and digital mode of payments have made things easier. However, there are some who believe that various aspects of this can be improved further. That’s where CityCash comes in.

CityCash is a startup that believes that the current system is not geared towards micropayments. According to them, the system is equipped to handle high-value transactions but probably not the kind of transaction that people deal with on a daily basis- bus tickets, grocery stores etc. Republic World’s Ankit Prasad recently spoke to Citycash’s founder & CEO Vineet Toshniwal who elaborated on Citycash’s offerings and future plans.

What was the inspiration behind Citycash?

“After travelling all over the world, one finds there is an abundance of integrated transit and payment cards, like Hong Kong has Octopus card and London has Oyster cards- where the micropayment ecosystem has completely seeded by these cards. Similarly, CityCash uses NFC (Near-field communication) technology deployed in its cards which makes them multipurpose and helps in ‘Tap to Pay’. This is also the company’s pitch toward Aatmanirbhar Bharat- raising the ease of living for the common man,” Vineet Toshniwal says. 

CityCash – Tap to Pay

“Firstly, the city authorities teamed up with these card companies and they launched the card for the transit payments. Entire transit sectors in those cities went digital completely and people also switched their habits from cash to first digital payment cards. Once they got used to making payments for transit they started using the same instrument for small value retail also like small grocery shops, 7/11s, coffee shops etc- and later it became a de facto cash instrument for people to Tap and Pay. Every world city has a card like this but I was amazed that not even one single city in India has such a card. So, unfortunately in India people on a daily basis for small value payments, people are forced to pay in cash- as there is no gear to handle small value payments,” Toshniwal adds.

How to equip people with the card and having a point of sale (POS) terminal where the card can be used?

‘The phone is the solution’

“Technology has evolved very fast with time and yesterday what used to be constrained will not be now or moving forward. Earlier, it used to be a card and people were tapping it on the POS (Point-of-Sale) terminal. But now the phone has become a card- It can be downloaded on phones electronically as most of the phones are now coming with NFC chips. Jio (Reliance) is proposing to launch with Google – affordable phones for $50 which will already have an installed NFC chip- that will transform Phones into a card. Same phones become a POS also- it has been launched as a soft-POS solution where the Android phone itself downloads the app and anyone can register themselves as a merchant and then start accepting the payments. So no machine is needed to make the payment, just have a card or the virtual card on the phone and by tapping phones the transactions can be done,” stated CityCash’s founder and CEO.

Enrollment in Citycash:

For Consumers: People can download the virtual card, KYC can be done on their own by the Aadhaar card and then the consumer will receive an OTP. The card can be recharged by directly linking to the bank accounts or by UPI apps. You can also walk into a CityCash centre, purchase the card by using Mobile OTP on the spot.

For Merchants: Download the app, do the minimum KYC and fill in the basic information required as per RBI norms and then you will be activated as a merchant and can accept the payments.

Citycash’s CEO…