Airport Retailers Oddly Behind in Chinese Mobile Payment Rush

November 29, 2024         By: Steven Anderson

We’ve seen, in the last few months, an almost frantic push for Alipay—and to a lesser extent WeChat Pay—to be accepted in pretty much every country that the growing Chinese tourist class might actually wander into. However, as pointed out by Jing Travel, one unusual lag has shown up, as many airports aren’t taking mobile payments systems, especially Chinese mobile payments.

There’s no doubt that mobile payments are huge in China, especially as 2016’s figures alone reached $5 trillion in transaction volume and more likely to follow. Additionally, that same growing Chinese tourist class is frantically shopping at duty-free airport shopping venues, so much so that it’s become the most popular type of retailer for Chinese travelers. Since duty-free shopping is branching out beyond the airport, it’s become a downright necessity for any duty-free shop to offer a connection to the Chinese mobile payment market.

Such an enthusiasm for duty-free shopping has actually spurred some changes in the way airports provide services. Heathrow Airport, for example, has brought out the “passenger ambassador”, a person devoted to pursuing the Chinese tourist and encouraging them to shop. This turned out to be a public-relations nightmare—Travel Weekly noted the ambassadors were paid on commission—but the basic notion is sound enough.

This is a particular problem given that mobile payments systems are expanding so rapidly. There’s little doubt that Alipay wants to be just about anywhere a Chinese citizen would conceivably set foot, so making arrangements to take Alipay should be about as easy as calling the company, saying you’re a business and having Ant Financial literally fall all over itself to get the necessary infrastructure and training in play. The company wants to process those payments. It’s their bread and butter. Why wouldn’t airports want to do what they could to make the process easier for clearly motivated Chinese ready to spend?

Maybe it’s got something to do with overall infrastructure. Maybe the connectivity at airports isn’t up to snuff. But with ticket prices being what they are, you’d figure they’d be willing to bite the bullet of lower profits for a year or two to trick out the airport with fiber connections and make the mobile shopping experience easier and better for travelers.