UnionPay in giant duty free pact

UnionPay International has launched a privilege program featuring special discounts at 80 duty free shops in 70 airports by partnering with 16 world-renowned duty free groups.

Holders of UnionPay cards with a number starting with 62 can receive discounts of at least five per cent during their international travels.

“As China becomes the world’s second largest tourism source country, we’re keeping up with the trends that individual and in-depth tours have become more popular to continuously enrich our global cardholder privilege system,” said Dong Li, chief branding officer of UnionPay International.

“Airport duty free shops are must-visit shopping sites for many during their travel, we wish to provide both domestic and overseas cardholders with better card-using experiences at airports around the world by rolling out the latest privilege program.”

The program is an upgrade of the one of last year that features exclusive discounts at 60 airport duty free shops with many highlights.

It covers a wide range of destinations inside Asia and beyond, including Hong Kong, Taiwan, Japan, South Korea, southeast Asia, Europe, North America, Australia, New Zealand and the Middle East. A total of 17 airports among the top 20 global ones in terms of passenger flow participate in the program.

The promotion is focussed on the Labor Day and summer holiday vacation season during which Chinese tourists prefer to travel. But about 30 per cent of the duty free shops, including those in Paris Charles de Gaulle Airport, Toronto Pearson International Airport and Ngurah Rai International Airport, will extend the offers until the end of 2015.

A large number of new merchants are involved. International airports in emerging tourist destinations including Russia, Italy, Qatar, South Africa, Finland, Belgium and Fiji participate for the first time. UnionPay International also offers privileges in 5 domestic airport duty free shops in Guangzhou, Hangzhou and Kunming to overseas UnionPay cardholders.

Currently, the overseas UnionPay acceptance network has expanded to 150 countries and regions. UnionPay cards are accepted by 26 million merchants and 1.8 million ATMs worldwide. UnionPay has become the preferred payment service provider of Chinese outbound tourists. Since last year, UnionPay International has launched privilege programs featuring discounts at airport duty free shops, core business districts and tourist destinations.