The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) is planning to set up an ombudsman by March for increased digital payments complaints that are currently being handled by the banking ombudsman, reported The Economic Times.

In its Annual Report for 2017-18, the RBI had said it was considering a scheme to handle consumer complaints regarding the rapid growth of digital payments across the country. Multiple issues such as failed transactions or funds sent to the wrong address have cropped in the past one year, which has led RBI to set up the scheme, ET reported citing banking sources.

The central bank is in the process of creating offices across the country for the digital payments ombudsman, the report said. “We could have these offices set up by early next year. The central bank is working on creating a scheme and it should function very similar to the banking ombudsman,” sources familiar with the development told ET.

“The central bank is also trying to draw up a framework to collect information on the various types of frauds that are being reported in the overall payments space,” the report said quoting sources and added, “RBI’s overall aim through this is to reduce instances of fraud and ensure that confidence in the payment systems goes up.”

First Published:Nov 8, 2018 10:23 AM IST