InComm, a prepaid product and transaction services company, announced on April 4 that InComm Japan is partnering with Tencent FiT (Financial Technology), the provider of WeChat Pay services and part of the Tencent group of companies headquartered in Shenzen, China.
The press of PR Newswire released that WeChat Pay is a payment service for users of SNS "WeChat (Weixin)" that boasts more than 849 million monthly active users in China, handling more than 500 million transactions a day. The service is becoming one of the main streams of Chinese mobile payment methods. With this partnership, InComm's POSA technology1 will enable Chinese visitors in Japan to use their smartphone to pay for products and services, just as they already do in their home country.
InComm Japan's POSA network, which connects with more than 50,000 retail stores in the country, will facilitate customer purchases at the point of sale utilizing WeChat Pay issued barcodes. By leveraging this POSA technology, WeChat Pay customer account billing can be applied at the point of sale. This makes it unnecessary to set up a dedicated terminal and makes WeChat Pay services possible at all InComm retailers.
"We are pleased to announce our POSA technology is now available for alternative redemption purposes and very excited to have WeChat joining us," said Junichi Kito, Director of Business Development at InComm Japan. "In looking forward to the Tokyo Olympics in 2020, it is critical for Japanese retailers to prepare for global payment methods, which are convenient for travelers, and it is our mission to support that. We believe this will bring a great additional value for retailers and prepaid issuers in the global market."
In 2016, the number of Chinese visitors to Japan exceeded 5 million, the largest number of tourists ever to visit the island nation. The type of travel undertaken is also shifting from group travel to personal travel, and travelers no longer visit only preplanned destinations. This new partnership will allow all retail stores, not just those which typically handle tax-free sales, to process payments through registers at the point of sale.
