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About this tool
See why a UPI PIN can only send money, never receive it, and check any refund request against that rule.
The UPI refund scam works by getting you to authorise a payment while you believe you are receiving one. A UPI PIN authorises money leaving your account: receiving money on UPI needs nothing beyond your UPI ID or linked mobile number, and never a PIN, a QR scan or approval of a collect request. This explainer checks any request against that rule, shows the arithmetic of a promised refund against what is actually debited, walks through the call script stage by stage, and lists what to do if a payment has already gone through.
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Each action is tagged with the direction money actually moves, so the mismatch is visible instead of argued.
Shows the pretext, the urgency, the collect request and the retry as the sequence they always follow.
Points to the national helpline 1930 and cybercrime.gov.in, and to the bank number printed in the official app rather than one from a search result.
No. A UPI PIN authorises a debit from your account and nothing else. Anyone sending you money only needs your UPI ID or the mobile number linked to it, and the credit arrives with no action from you at all.
A collect request is someone asking you to pay them, and the sender can attach any text they like — including the word refund. Approving it opens your UPI PIN screen and debits the amount shown, so read the app's own wording, which says a payment is being requested from you.
No. Scanning a QR code always starts a payment from your account. There is no QR code that pulls money into your account, so being sent one to 'collect' a refund is conclusive.
Call 1930, the national cybercrime helpline, and file at cybercrime.gov.in, then inform your bank in writing using the number in its official app. Reporting fast matters because it is what allows the destination account to be flagged; note that a payment you approved with your own PIN is treated as authorised, so recovery is not automatic. This is informational, not legal advice.