The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) on Wednesday prohibited Mastercard Asia from on-boarding any new domestic customers onto its card network. According to the central bank’s order, the restrictions will come into place on July 22 of this year. 

“Notwithstanding lapse of considerable time and adequate opportunities being given, the entity has been found to be non-compliant with the directions on Storage of Payment System Data,” said a press statement issued by the RBI. 

In a press statement, the RBI clarified that its order would not impact existing customers of Mastercard. 

"Mastercard shall advise all card-issuing banks and non-banks to conform to these directions. The supervisory action has been taken in exercise of powers vested in RBI under Section 17 of the Payment and Settlement Systems Act, 2007 (PSS Act),” the RBI said. 

The central bank stated that payment system operator Mastercard was authorised to operate a card network under the RBI’s Payment and Settlement Systems Act, 2007. 

Citing its circular on Storage of Payment System Data dated April 6, 2018, the RBI said that all payment system operator providers were directed to ensure that the entire data related to their payment systems was stored on a system only in India.

The data in question included full end-to-end transaction details, customer information and payment instructions, among other key details.

At the time, the RBI had granted payment system operators six months to comply with the circular. 

Payment system operators, including Mastercard, were also asked to report compliance to the RBI and submit a board-approved system audit report conducted by a CERT-In-empanelled auditor.