In a significant development for digital payments, Singaporean QR wallets will soon be able to make payments in Japan. Under a new joint payment program, eight countries, including Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, the Philippines, Thailand, Cambodia, Vietnam, and India, will be able to scan Japan QR (JPQR) codes to make payments.
Japan aims to implement the changes before the Osaka World Expo, which begins on April 13, 2025. The country is currently working to ensure that Japan’s JPQR payment is compatible with the unified standards of the eight other countries. Japan will also work with Chinese payment services to incorporate them into the JPQR system.
However, Japan faces the challenge of increasing the usage of the QR code system, with only 15,000 businesses across Japan using the JPQR service. Kenichi Matsuguma, director of the cashless payment promotion office at Japan’s Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry, stated, “The challenge is that not many Japanese businesses are on board, though we hope the potential use by foreign visitors will be a catalyst to convince them to adopt JPQR.”
Japan is currently lagging behind ASEAN countries in usage of cashless payments. In 2023, less than 40 per cent of all transactions in Japan were cashless ones, significantly less than neighbouring countries China and South Korea, which boasted 83 per cent and 93.6 per cent of all transactions being cashless, respectively.
Credit card payments formed the bulk of cashless transactions in Japan in 2023, at 83.5 per cent, while QR code payments accounted for just 8.6 per cent of cashless transactions. The new joint payment program is expected to increase the usage of QR code payments in Japan, providing a more convenient and seamless payment experience for foreign visitors.