New Debit and Credit card rules from October 1: Check THIS step-by-step guide to tokenise your cards

New Delhi: The Reserve Bank of India (RBI)’s tokenisation rule will become mandatory from October 1. Every credit and debit card transaction via online, point-of-sale, and in-app must be done with unique tokens. Card tokensation will become compulsory for merchants. If you are curious about how to tokenise your credit/debit cards, then you can do so by following these six simple steps.

Card tokenisation means switching of actual card details with an alternative 16-digits code called the ‘tokens’, which shall be unique for every card. It will be generated by an algorithm, allowing doing transactions without exposing the actual card sensitive information.

RBI has shared six simple steps to generate a token for your debit/credit card:-

1. Visit any e-commerce/merchant website or application to make a purchase and start  a payment transaction.
2. During check-out, enter details of your debit/credit card. Alernatively, select your preferred bank’s debit/credit card saved earlier as payment method and enter other details.
3. Select the option “Secure your card as per RBI guidelines” or “tokenise your card as per RBI guidelines”.
4. Enter OTP sent to your registered mobile phone or email by your bank and complete the transaction.
5. Your token has been genreated and saved instead of actual details of your card.
6. When you visit the same website or application again, the last four digits of your saved card are displayed to help you identify your card for doing the payment.

It is to be noted that tokens will be merchant specific. If a consumer has a single card but uses online purchases from different merchants, different tokens will be issued. A token will be of 16 digits and unqiue for a combination of card and merchant.

A customer doesn’t need to remember tokens as they will be saved on the merchant platform. He/she will have to check the last four digit of the cards to make payment again on the same platform.