Alipay+ and LankaPay have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to enhance inbound and outbound travel experience through cross-border digital payments.

The partnership will enable users of Alipay+ payment partners to make cashless payments at over 400,000 LankaQR merchants across Sri Lanka.

Sri Lankans will also be able to use their LankaQR enabled apps to scan and pay at Alipay+ merchants globally when traveling overseas.

By early 2024, users of leading Asian e-wallets from the region including Hong Kong SAR, Philippines, Singapore, South Korea and Thailand, will be able to use cashless payments when they travel to Sri Lanka with Alipay+. More e-wallets are expected to join in the near future.

Additionally, all e-wallets supported by LankaPay will be accepted by Alipay+ global merchant network by end of 2024, enabling Sri Lankans traveling overseas to pay with their familiar home e-wallet. Alipay+ is currently accepted at tens of millions of merchants in more than 50 countries.

The partnership is expected to boost tourism in Sri Lanka, which is experiencing a boom in arrivals. In the first nine months of 2023, Sri Lanka received more than 1 million tourists, surpassing the 720,000 in the whole of 2022.

Alipay+ and LankaPay will also be partnering on joint marketing efforts to promote Sri Lanka as a tourist destination and tourism-related local businesses overseas.

Channa de Silva, Chief Executive Officer of LankaPay said,

“We believe this partnership will provide greater convenience to Asian tourists visiting Sri Lanka and a more acceptable proposition especially to the SME merchants with substantially low commission rate compared to card payments.

Therefore, we envisage that our efforts will invariably motivate more SME merchants to come onboard digital platforms, which is essential in developing the country’s digital eco-system to propel the the tourism industry and the national economy.”

Dr. Cherry Huang, General Manager of Alipay+ Offline Merchant Services, Ant Group said,

“Alipay+ continues to accelerate the shift towards digital travel in more regions through our integrations with national standardised QR codes, this time in Sri Lanka with LankaPay.

As global travel recovers, we’ve noticed a shift in travel preferences, including travelers’ heightened expectations of how digital solutions should enhance their travel experience and greater interest in visiting previously less-explored destinations.”

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• Source: https://fintechnews.sg/79150/sri-lanka/alipay-now-supports-lankapay-for-cross-border-digital-payments/