Google is pausing free trials for Play Store apps in India, blame the new RBI regulation

Google is only complying with the mandate that the Reserve Bank of India issued earlier this year.

Google is hitting pause on the free trials that you see for hundreds of apps on the Play Store in India. That is because Google is in the process of complying with the new regulations from the Reserve Bank of India (RBI). RBI, earlier this year, issued new guidelines that make authentication necessary for recurring payments, which are often required when trials are over for automatic charging. Google is also suspending auto-renewals of subscriptions for Play Store apps because of the RBI regulation in India. According to XDA Developers, Google has sent out emails to developers to suspend recurring transactions inside Google Play Store. This means when you buy a new subscription inside the app marketplace, you will no longer be able to set it for auto-renewal. Google has been offering auto-renewing subscriptions in India that use billing through credit cards, debit cards, UPI, digital wallets, and other prepaid payment instruments (PPI) such as postpaid billing. RBI’s new regulation requires users to authenticate the payment every time through a one-time password (OTP), defying the entire concept of auto-renewal. In its emails, Google has specified that both auto-renewing subscriptions and free trials will remain suspended “until the ecosystem challenges are addressed.” This means Google may reinstate auto-renewals and free trials at a later stage -- when the company has sorted out how to effectively comply with the regulation. But for now, all monthly subscriptions will be available as single passes and end on the last day of the month. You will have to manually subscribe at the end of every month to continue with the subscription. And that is also why developers will not be able to automatically charge users when the trial period expires, which is why there will be no trial periods.