How does an Indian D2C brand collect payments for cross-border e-commerce exports?

What counts as an e-commerce export?

Chapter 9 of the Foreign Trade Policy 2023 defines e-commerce exports of goods as exports where selling is through the internet on an e-commerce platform, and payment is made through international credit or debit cards or other authorised electronic payment channels specified by RBI. The same definition covers services sold online. An e-commerce platform includes a seller’s own web portal, not only a marketplace.

So a jewellery brand in Jaipur that sells a pair of earrings to a shopper in Melbourne through its own website is an exporter, with the same core duties as a firm shipping a container: declare the export, realise the money, and keep the paper trail. What changes is scale. Instead of one shipping bill for USD 40,000, you may have four hundred parcels a month of USD 100 each.

How can a D2C brand collect payment from overseas shoppers?

1. Your own website, collected by a PA-CB

A cross-border payment aggregator (PA-CB) collects what an overseas buyer pays and settles it to the Indian merchant. RBI has regulated PA-CBs directly since its circular of 31 October 2023; the rules now sit in its Master Direction of 15 September 2025. The points that matter to a D2C seller, from paragraphs 11 and 13 of that direction:

• ₹25 lakh per transaction, the maximum value for an inward PA-CB transaction. Retail orders sit far below it.
• Documents for EDPMS. The PA-CB must give exporters the documents their AD banks need to close the matching export entries.
• Settlement currency. Settlement in a currency other than the rupee is allowed only for exporters the PA-CB has onboarded directly.
• Simplified KYC for a merchant whose annual export turnover does not exceed ₹5 lakh: PAN verification, contact-point verification and one officially valid document of the proprietor.

The full rules are in RBI’s PA-CB rules explained. Card pricing is published by some gateways: as checked on 30 October 2026, Stripe India lists 3% for Visa and Mastercard cards issued outside India, plus 2% if currency conversion is needed, and 3.5% (plus 2%) for American Express. PayPal India lists 4.40% + USD 0.30 for international commercial payments, with a 3.0% conversion spread.

2. A marketplace abroad

On a marketplace, the shopper pays the marketplace, which pays you after deducting its commission and fees. You are still the exporter, so the export rules below still apply. Before you list, find out how the marketplace pays out to India: in a single bulk transfer, or with a statement that ties each payout to the orders it covers. Without that statement, matching receipts to shipping bills becomes guesswork.

3. The inventory-based framework

Chapter 9 of the Foreign Trade Policy now includes an Inventory-based Cross-border E-Commerce Facilitation Framework (paras 9.13–9.19). An Exporter-on-Record, an entity with an IEC and GSTIN registered with DGFT, buys goods of Indian origin from Sellers-on-Record against confirmed export orders, holds them as export-only inventory and exports them. It must pay the seller within 7 days of accepting the goods, and that payment may not depend on the foreign buyer paying or returning the goods. Returned consignments may not be sold in India. For a small brand this shifts the export, the collection and the returns to the Exporter-on-Record; your sale to it takes place in India.

How do the goods leave India?

• Courier. Para 9.05 permits exports through a registered courier service under Customs notifications, and says there shall be no value limit per consignment for courier exports. What may be exported still depends on the export policy for the item.
• Post. Para 9.12 provides for Dak Ghar Niryat Kendras, working with Foreign Post Offices in a hub-and-spoke model, to help artisans, weavers, craftsmen and MSMEs in the hinterland reach buyers abroad. Postal exports use a postal bill of export and a postal receipt, two of the mandatory documents in para 2.06.
• E-Commerce Export Hubs (ECEHs). Para 9.08–9.11 provide for designated hubs with storage, packaging, labelling, testing and logistics, set up mostly by private operators.
• Bulk to a warehouse abroad. You can also ship stock to a warehouse overseas and sell from there; see realisation below.

When must e-commerce export proceeds be realised?

The FEMA regulations in force since 1 October 2026 make no special timing rule for online sales. The value of each shipment must be realised within 9 months of the date of shipment. For goods sent to a warehouse outside India, the 9 months run from the date the goods are sold from the warehouse. Exports invoiced in rupees get 12 months.

Small parcels have one easier path. Where the shipping bill is up to ₹10 lakh, regulation 4(2) lets the EDPMS entry be closed on your declaration that the payment was realised, in full or otherwise, and declarations can be filed quarterly in bulk. For a D2C seller with hundreds of small shipments, ask your AD bank early how it wants those bulk declarations. The background is in the export realisation period in 2026.

What about refunds and chargebacks?

Retail buyers pay by card, so retail buyers can dispute. Under the Visa rules most disputes must be raised within 120 days of processing, and PayPal gives buyers 180 days to open a dispute for an item not received. A refunded or charged-back order is an export that was not fully realised, so record it against the shipping bill: your AD bank can accept a reduction in export value based on your declaration. Keep proof of dispatch and delivery tracking for every order. Chargebacks and disputes explains the process.

Which documents should a D2C exporter keep?

The settlement report is the piece most sellers miss. It is what lets your bank tie a single settlement to many small shipping bills. Payzoplus supports cross-border collection for Indian exporters through an RBI-authorised payment partner, with the bank’s FIRA passed on for each settlement.