A visitor to Brazil may want to sample food sold by local street vendors, but they may not be able to pay using the country’s popular method: Pix, the QR-based instant payments network.
It’s a common pain point for travelers worldwide, and one that international transaction payments platform Wise aims to address by adding cross-border QR payments to its app. The company plans to integrate with domestic payment schemes that have gained traction in several markets, including Pix, Singapore’s PayNow, Hungary’s Qvik, and QR Ph in the Philippines.
Wise has also partnered with Alipay+ to expand QR payment coverage across popular tourist destinations in Asia. The arrangement lets customers pay directly from their existing Wise accounts through local QR systems, rather than having to rely on cards or cash.
Creating Walled Gardens
QR payments can reduce friction at checkout, while the networks behind them facilitate real-time settlement at relatively low cost. That combination has helped drive the rapid adoption of real-time payments in markets such as India and Brazil. But because many of these systems were built primarily for domestic use, they can create walled gardens that make cross-border transactions more difficult for travelers and merchants.
That has prompted a growing number of efforts to connect these systems. For example, global payments gateway Alipay+ recently expanded its platform to Latin America. The integration is designed to allow visitors to make QR-code payments at participating merchants using the wallets they already use at home.
The Importance of Tourism
China has also been working to improve payment connectivity across Southeast Asia. The widespread use of localized digital wallets and super apps like WeChat Pay and Alipay has created a similar challenge for travelers visiting the region.
As part of those efforts, China recently connected Indonesia’s Quick Response Code Indonesian Standard (QRIS) with major payment ecosystems, including Alipay and UnionPay. The connection allows consumers in the region’s largest digital economy to scan QR codes and pay using familiar apps while transacting in local currencies.
All these developments underscore the importance of tourism and cross-border commerce to economies around the world. As more countries adopt domestic real-time payment systems, connecting those networks across borders could become an important part of the payments landscape.
