PAYMENT DEAL: More than 400 Walmart stores in China will accept Alipay by year’s end

Walmart is to begin accepting Alipay mobile payments at 25 stores in Shenzhen, China, and the service is to go live in all of the chain’s 410 stores across 160 Chinese cities by the end of this year.

“Consumers can check out their shopping carts and pay by Alipay Wallet’s scan-to-pay on their smartphones,” Alibaba’s online financial service Ant Financial explains.

“The payment process only takes approximately three seconds and consumers can track the payments via Alipay Wallet.

“Walmart’s cash registers need no extra equipment to accept Alipay Wallet mobile payments; the standard barcode scanning guns will suffice for consumers to pay with Alipay.

“Ant Financial and Walmart are collaborating on various projects, including big data sharing and analysis, to provide not only secure and efficient payment methods for consumers but to upgrade its overall shopping experience at Walmart.”

“Increasing the number of offline scenarios that accept Alipay payment is an important strategy for Ant Financial,” the company told NFC World. “Teaming up with Walmart will provide a way for our 270 million Alipay Wallet users to use mobile payments in a secure and convenient manner.”