The National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) on February 19, 2026, issued the Guidelines regarding document submission at Arbitration stage & revision of Dispute TAT for NFS.
The National Financial Switch (NFS), operated by National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI), reviewed dispute resolution data for NFS ATM transactions and found that many arbitration cases are initiated without adequate due diligence by issuing banks. Analysis of the past six months shows that more than half of arbitration decisions have favored acquiring banks, indicating avoidable escalations.
To improve decision-making and reduce unnecessary arbitration, acquiring banks will now be required to submit all relevant supporting evidence—such as transaction logs and CCTV footage—at the chargeback or pre-arbitration stage itself. Decisions at the NRP/PRD level will be based strictly on documents submitted up to pre-arbitration, and additional evidence submitted later will not be considered unless specifically requested by the arbitration panel.
The framework also revises turnaround times to support better evidence submission and faster dispute resolution. The pre-arbitration timeline has been extended from 7 days to 10 days to allow acquiring banks sufficient time to provide documentation. At the same time, the arbitration response period for acceptance or rejection has been reduced from 10 days to 5 days.
These changes aim to streamline the dispute process, ensure better-quality case submissions, and minimize avoidable arbitration. The revised rules will come into effect from March 19, 2026.
[Notification No. NPCI/NFS/OC 426/2025-26]
