A Theoretical and Empirical Perspective on Customer Satisfaction and Loyalty in Mobile Payment Platforms

India's dramatic shift to digital payments has altered the country's financial environment by moving people from cash to mobile payments. This study uses a mixedmethod methodology (i.e., data collection and analysis using SPSS and SmartPLS) to examine factors influencing customer satisfaction, loyalty, and switching intentions with regard to digital payment users in India. With a 95.3 % active user base, mostly female (66 %) and primarily between the ages of 18 and$\mathbf{2 5}(\mathbf{7 6 \%})$, the research findings show that security, satisfaction, and functional value are important factors that contribute to loyalty, while emotional, epistemic, and monetary value have no discernible effect. Based on Cronbach's alpha testing at 0.917, there is good evidence of the measurement model, while Structural Equation Modelling results indicate that users believed efficiency, performance and platform trust meant more than a perceived loyalty in spending as indicated by promotion benefit and emotional attachment. Despite high levels of adoption, the findings suggest there is very low frequency of transaction$(84.1 \% \leq 10$transactions/month), indicating that although there is a high level of adoption the assumption of active transactional use may be overestimating actual engagement. Improving functionality, speed, transparency and clarity of security communications will improve user loyalty. In the future, studies may focus on using AI powered payments with blockchain based processes to increase user security, explicit desires of users to earn rewards associated with their switching behavior, and exploring user data across geographic regions to further examine digital payment users' willingness to transition to automated digital payments.