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Comment by sudshekhar | Hacker News Reader

Hey, answering the questions below

1) https://transcorpint.com/find-us => You can verify yourself at any of these centers across India.

We'll improve the site to directly point customers to appropriate verification centers (thanks for pointing this out)

2) OCI holders are accepted as well. Only your passport and OCI card are required

3) Add funds facility is instantenous. And is available in the app once you've finished the verification. You'll be able to add funds via any card, and instantly receive funds in your Cheq wallet for spending.

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I went over the list and IMO the omission of any verification center at the airport creates a huge friction in your app's adoption.

Just looking at the locations, it's a 2-3hr cab ride in Mumbai/Kolkata between the airports and the transcorp centers during rush hours, and 1-2hr trip in Delhi. Also credit cards are widely accepted at most places except roadside stalls, etc.

This service would be beneficial to visitors and NRIs (like me) if cross-sold with SIM cards or in currency exchanges at airports, otherwise I fail to see a valid use case due to the sheer inconvenience of having to take such a long cab ride in traffic. Also a lot of international flights land at night so visitors would have to dedicate at least half of next day to go verify their identity.

>We'll improve the site to directly point customers to appropriate verification centers (thanks for pointing this out)

You probably would want to co-operate with the SIM vendor offices at airports, they already do same checks if you want mobile data in India so might as well do it for UPI.

Is there any plan of having verification centers or online verification services in US itself ?

We will try to get permissions to kickstart verification services in US soon.

Doing the account opening process online would be best but isn't allowed under existing regulations.

You guys shot yourself in the foot by using Transcorp. They only have a presence in Punjab and with a smattering in Haryana, UK, and Delhi.

The target persona who would use this is probably in the Indo-American diaspora, which skews Telugu, Malayali, Kannada, and Tamil - and that too a mix of larger cities and smaller towns (the South Indian versions of Moga and Ludhiana such as Coimbatore, Thrissur, Warangal).

In my experience, Punjabi NRIs are tech averse and tend to head directly to the pind where you can still use cash, or stick with Chandigarh/Delhi, where credit card support is mainstream.

Re-pivot to target the more tech aware Indian diaspora in the US - they would be more open to adopting a "random" app (not to dunk on you guys - getting into YC is amazing, but it doesn't have street credit outside the Bay Area).

I was about to suggest this app to a friend travelling to India but quickly backed out after checking the location of the nearest centers.

It's a connundrum whether these centers are more useful at/near airports or city centers. I would think airports, and therefore someone travelling to Mysore wouldn't need to go to your Bangalore center, but I may be wrong.

If you don't mind sharing, what's the thought that went into these locations?

We don't have much say in the placement of these centers.

Transcorp has been operating from these locations since the last 20 years or so. Cheq is just hopping aboard.

We can also arrange for home/hotel verification to tourists. An agent will travel to your location and finish the verification.

However, this facility is only available in a limited number of cities across India and we're already backlogged with requests.

We'll work on improving ease of onboarding in the coming months for sure.

This app looks great. As a tourist currently in India I am very interested.

Handing over my passport doesn’t bother me as most hotels ask for it and take a copy at check in.

However I am in Leh.

And your link above doesn’t seem to open on my phone here (Airtel SIM).

I hope you manage to make it easier to apply - sounds like a great idea.

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