Customers making cross-border payments to and from accounts in India: Purpose of Payment requirements

Last updated: 29 May 2017

All cross-border remittances to and from India are governed by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) and are subject to Foreign Exchange Management Act (FEMA) regulations. In compliance with these regulations, your payments to and from India must include Purpose of Payment details.

Payment instructions submitted on-screen or via File Upload without valid Purpose of Payment information will be rejected.

Select here to view common examples of Purpose of Payment transaction details for payments to and from India >

Customers submitting payments on-screen
In the Information for the beneficiary section of your Priority Payment/Customer Transfer instruction and template screens, choose /RFB/ as the SWIFT codeword for Remittance information and enter the Purpose of Payment details in the text fields.

(Select image to enlarge)

Customers submitting payments via the File Upload
If you are submitting your payments via File Upload, the Purpose of Payment information needs to be included in Tag 70 of MT103 file formats.

For questions on Purpose of Payment requirements in India, please contact your local HSBCnet Support Centre.