China travel: cashless-society shift hits foreign tourists who really want to open wallets and spend

Travelling to multiple Chinese cities late last year, Derek Cheung, an investor from Singapore, found himself having trouble making simple, everyday payments in China’s increasingly cashless society.

When he ate at restaurants where QR payment codes were registered to individuals instead of merchants, he could not use WeChat Pay – one of China’s major mobile payment services – as the payment-service provider restricts individual transfers to accounts linked with international cards.