UnionPay International, along with partners, has initiated a pilot launch of a new cross-border QR payment system between China and Indonesia.  

This cross-border QR payment linkage is being carried out under the supervision of the central banks of the two nations. 

In Beijing, the pilot was launched with a transaction demonstration in Beijing using an Indonesian mobile payment application.  

Simultaneously, in Jakarta, a select group of users “successfully” completed transactions through the UnionPay App and Alipay app by scanning QRIS, Indonesia’s standardised QR code. 

The “sandbox” phase allows a “selected” number of users from China to make QR payments with the two Chinese mobile payment apps at over 40 million QRIS merchants in Indonesia.  

In parallel, Chinese pilot merchants with UnionPay and Alipay capabilities can also accept QR payments from 22 Indonesian mobile payment apps. 

The current phase is restricted to pre-approved participants and merchants, with expectations to fully operationalise the system by 2025 after the trial period is concluded. 

The project is part of a government-to-government (G2G) initiative. 

Earlier in January 2025, UnionPay signed a memorandum of cooperation with several Indonesian financial entities, including the Indonesian Payment System Association (ASPI), Ant International, and the Bank of China (Hong Kong) Jakarta Branch.  

This was followed by cooperation agreements with Indonesia’s switch networks—Rintis, ALTO, Artajasa, and Jalin—and with Ant International and Alipay, to facilitate the project’s advancement. 

As per the bilateral agreement, the QR payment transactions between the two countries will be settled in their local currencies. 

UnionPay is also extending its QR payment linkage to other regions, with partnerships in 19 countries and regions outside of mainland China. 

In July, UnionPay enabled Vietnamese cardholders to link their UnionPay cards with Alipay and WeChat Pay for transactions in China.