Reference
India fintech glossary
Plain-English definitions of the payments, lending, identity, risk and AI terms used across the ZyroAI platform.
Payments & rails
- UPI (Unified Payments Interface)
- NPCI's real-time interbank payment system that lets users send and receive money instantly using a virtual address, without sharing bank details.
- NPCI
- National Payments Corporation of India — the not-for-profit body that operates India's retail payment rails, including UPI, IMPS, RuPay and NACH.
- TPAP (Third-Party Application Provider)
- An app that offers UPI payments to users by partnering with a sponsor bank (PSP), rather than holding the UPI licence itself.
- PSP (Payment Service Provider)
- A bank authorised by NPCI to connect to UPI and sponsor third-party apps onto the network.
- Acquiring
- Enabling a merchant to accept payments — capturing the transaction and routing it to the customer's bank.
- Issuing
- Providing the customer-side instrument, such as a prepaid wallet, card or UPI handle.
- IMPS
- Immediate Payment Service — NPCI's 24x7 real-time fund transfer rail, used widely for instant payouts.
- NEFT
- National Electronic Funds Transfer — an RBI-operated rail that settles transfers around the clock in batches.
- RTGS
- Real-Time Gross Settlement — an RBI rail for high-value transfers, settled individually in real time.
- UPI AutoPay
- A UPI mandate feature that lets users authorise recurring payments, such as subscriptions, against their bank account.
- UPI Lite
- An on-device wallet for low-value UPI payments that clears without a PIN and reduces load on bank systems.
- RuPay Credit Card on UPI
- An NPCI feature that links a RuPay credit card to a UPI handle so it can be used for UPI payments.
- PPI (Prepaid Payment Instrument)
- An RBI-regulated instrument — such as a wallet or prepaid card — that stores value loaded in advance for payments.
- VPA / UPI handle
- Virtual Payment Address — a user-friendly UPI identifier (e.g. name@bank) that maps to a bank account.
- Penny-drop verification
- A bank-account check that deposits a tiny amount to confirm the account number and holder name before payouts.
- Settlement
- The process of moving funds between banks so that a completed transaction is finally paid out to the recipient.
Identity & KYC
- KYC (Know Your Customer)
- The regulated process of verifying a customer's identity before offering financial services, per RBI norms.
- eKYC
- Electronic KYC — paperless identity verification using digital records such as Aadhaar.
- V-CIP / Video KYC
- Video-based Customer Identification Process — an RBI-permitted method of completing KYC over a live video interaction.
- Aadhaar
- India's 12-digit unique identity number issued by UIDAI, used for identity and address verification.
- PAN
- Permanent Account Number — the tax identity issued by the Income Tax Department, used in financial KYC.
- Liveness detection
- A check that confirms a real, live person is present during verification, defeating photos or replays.
- Face match
- Comparing a selfie against a document or reference photo to confirm the same person.
- OCR
- Optical Character Recognition — extracting text from a captured document image, such as a PAN or Aadhaar card.
Lending
- LOS (Loan Origination System)
- Software that handles the front of the loan lifecycle: application, KYC, credit checks and approval.
- LMS (Loan Management System)
- Software that services a loan after disbursal: repayment schedules, accounting, restructuring and closure.
- Co-lending
- An arrangement where two lenders — typically a bank and an NBFC — jointly fund a loan and share the exposure.
- NBFC
- Non-Banking Financial Company — an RBI-registered lender that provides credit without a full banking licence.
- Credit bureau
- An agency that maintains credit histories and scores. India's four bureaus are CIBIL, Experian, Equifax and CRIF.
- Underwriting
- Assessing a borrower's risk and ability to repay to decide whether, and on what terms, to lend.
- Disbursal
- Releasing approved loan funds to the borrower.
- Collections
- Recovering repayments on outstanding loans, including reminders and follow-up on overdue accounts.
Risk, fraud & compliance
- AML (Anti-Money Laundering)
- Controls and checks that detect and prevent the use of financial systems to launder illicit funds.
- PEP (Politically Exposed Person)
- An individual in a prominent public role who warrants enhanced due diligence due to higher risk.
- Transaction monitoring
- Screening transactions in real time or in batches to flag suspicious or fraudulent activity.
- RBI
- Reserve Bank of India — the central bank and primary regulator for banking and payments in India.
- Data residency
- Keeping data physically stored within a defined jurisdiction — for Indian financial data, within India.
- Sovereign / India-hosted
- Infrastructure and data kept under Indian jurisdiction and operated in-country, rather than on foreign clouds.
AI & customer experience
- Voice AI agent
- An automated conversational agent that speaks with customers over phone, app or messaging for support and service.
- Barge-in
- The ability for a caller to interrupt a voice agent mid-sentence, making the conversation feel natural.
- TTS (Text-to-Speech)
- Technology that converts text into spoken audio; neural TTS produces more human-like speech.
- WhatsApp Business API
- Meta's official programmatic interface for businesses to send and receive WhatsApp messages at scale.
Building on these rails? Explore the products or book a demo.