UnionPay International announced in Shanghai the launch of its Summer Marketing Campaign together with its partners to comprehensively improve the payment experiences of outbound tourists. Cai Jianbo, CEO of UnionPay International, and heads of 14 banks, 12 travel service providers and several global merchants attended the press conference.
In 2014, UnionPay International launched its three major marketing campaigns, namely the “Global Top 60 Airports”, the “30 Selected Travel Destinations” and the “30 Core Business Districts”. Since then, the scale of these three campaigns expanded each year and this year, it covers 100 airports, 60 travel destinations and 60 business districts. On the basis of these campaigns, UnionPay International further launched its cross-border marketing platform U Plan, which has now attracted 23 banks, travel agencies and airlines and over 2,000 stores across 12 countries and regions outside mainland China to participate, enhancing the service capability of the tourism industry.
“We take ‘cross-over cooperation and privileged experience’ as the theme of our campaign to show that UnionPay is willing to make full use of the advantage of a bankcard association as a platform to unite all players in the industry to jointly provide better payment experience,” said Cai Jianbo, “Over the past few years, we’ve not only cooperated with financial enterprises and the tourism, but have also collaborated with emerging Internet companies in upgrading our payment services, value-added services, privilege system and innovative products, enhancing our service capacity and optimizing user experience.”
Large scale and substantial discounts: covering the whole journey
In this Summer Marketing Campaign, the 60 Selected Travel Destinations offers are coupled with the offers of U Plans, delivering more diverse and convenient payment services to cardholders.
The campaign has two highlights: First, it covers about 10,000 stores across 30 countries and regions, covering fields of catering, accommodation, transport, shopping and entertainment. UnionPay International also designed seven themed travel routes cardholders for the first time. Second, offers can be enjoyed during the whole course of traveling: discount for flight ticket and hotel booking; WiFi rental, car rental and airport shuttle bus discounts; exclusive offers at merchants; UnionPay tax refund service; and cash-back provided by issuers.
It is worth noting that the Food & Beverage Themed Route covers 18 Michelin-starred restaurants and three major French chateaus, while the Museum Themed Route covers 9 major art galleries and museums. Cardholders may visit the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York and Louvre Museum in France free of charge. The Exploration Themed Route provides discounts for cardholders visiting Africa, the Middle East and Russia. The Belt and Road Route provides UnionPay offers at renowned merchants across 13 countries including Russia, Southeast Asia and the Middle East.
Moreover, UnionPay International will provide exclusive offers for the Chinese students who study in Europe, the U.S., Australia and New Zealand. The offers include online and offline tuition payment discounts at over 400 schools, and exclusive UnionPay privileges at restaurants and stores near the schools.
UnionPay innovative payment to meet the diverse demands of the young
Many outbound tourists travel with their families during the summer vacation and the post-1980s have become the majority of these tourists. According to the Annual Report on China’s Outbound Tourism Development 2016 issued by China Tourism Academy, post-1980s prefer free-and-independent and in-depth travels. They like to book flight tickets, hotels and half self-help products online before departure, and prefer mobile payments.
Cardholders can also enjoy payment convenience offered by UnionPay mobile QuickPass and U Plan. Many merchants in Singapore, Hong Kong, Thailand, Australia and New Zealand offer exclusive discounts for mobile QuickPass. Mobile QuickPass NFC contactless payment is accepted at about 500,000 POS terminals outside mainland China, and mobile QuickPass QR code payment has been launched in Hong Kong and Singapore.
On the same day, representatives from CITS, Agriculture Bank of China and LUKFOOK JEWELLERY each made a speech at the press conference and all expressed their willingness to collaborate more closely with UnionPay International to meet the changing travel and payment demands of their common customers.
