French payments specialist Ingenico Group has inked a deal with Alipay, the payment platform operated by Ant Financial Services Group, to extend Alipay acceptance to banks and acquirers in Europe.

 

The move follows their initial agreement in 2016 that paved the way for hundreds of European brick and mortar stores to accept the Chinese mobile wallet.

Ingenico launched a new turnkey solution that allows for automatic boarding and activation of merchants and provides transaction reconciliation as well as access to advanced customer data on a web portal.

The solution is based on the recognition of the Alipay QR-code displayed on the customer’s smartphone by the POS (transaction scan) or the reverse (merchant scan), Ingenico said. This code includes information for the secure management of the transaction by the Ingenico terminal.

The French group added that the integration of Alipay payment method is fully compatible with all payment applications already installed on the POS.

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Luciano Cavazzana, SVP EMEA – Banks & Acquirers Business Unit of Ingenico Group, said: “Ingenico is delighted to be the first provider of a turnkey solution for Alipay acceptance, easy to implement for banks and acquirers. This solution enables them to improve their offer to merchants, constantly trying to expand their payment method portfolio. This also confirms our design capabilities and the versatility of our terminals, for the benefit of all players in the payment ecosystem.”

Alipay EMEA head Rita Liu said: “Ingenico’s new solution adds an easy go-to-solution for any acquirers who are Ingenico’s clients to start accepting Alipay. Europe is always the ideal destination for high-income Chinese tourists. We are expecting more acquirers and merchants to join Ant Financial’s ecosystem to bring better cashless experience to Chinese customers.”