The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) on Wednesday (24th August 2022) lifted the indefinite ban on American Express that was imposed over one year ago. Vide order dated April 23, 2021, RBI had imposed restrictions on American Express Banking Corp. from onboarding new customers for not abiding by RBI’s circular dated April 6, 2018, on Storage of Payment System Data.
The RBI, in an official press release, said, “In view of the satisfactory compliance demonstrated by American Express Banking Corp. with the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) circular dated April 6, 2018, on Storage of Payment System Data, the restrictions imposed, vide order dated April 23, 2021, on on-boarding of new domestic customers have been lifted with immediate effect.”, on Wednesday, the 24th of August, 2022.
Reacting to the RBI’s statement, Sanjay Khanna, the CEO, and COO at American Express, said, “We welcome today’s decision by the Reserve Bank of India, which enables American Express Network to onboard new customers effective immediately. India is a key strategic market for American Express, and today’s decision is the result of our significant local investments in technology, infrastructure, and resources.”
Amex also welcomed the decision and expressed their views on the same on their official Indian Twitter channel (image attached below).
Effective immediately, American Express can now onboard new customers onto its card network. This should mean the resumption of the issuance of new Amex credit cards, which a lot of people have been long waiting for. Amex is expected to resume operations in full swing in a week. Earlier in July this year, the RBI had also lifted a similar ban on Mastercard.
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