微信支付首次登陸英國
在倫敦卡姆登市場(chǎng)(Camden Market，見文首照片)的一條巷子里，一名身著黑色破洞牛仔褲、手戴露指手套的女性在iPad屏幕上不停擺弄。和這里的大多數(shù)店主一樣，?，?bull;皮奧尼亞(Emma Peonia)通常把衣服賣給文身的年輕人，他們用借記卡或者現(xiàn)金支付。但現(xiàn)在，她第一次用一款中國支付應(yīng)用來賣一件Iron Maiden樂隊(duì)T恤衫。
“My boss thought it would be useful — she has just created a new website,” she says. “She wants to sell more to Chinese tourists.”
“我的老板覺得這會(huì)派上用場(chǎng)——她剛剛建了一個(gè)新網(wǎng)站。”皮奧尼亞說，“她想把更多商品賣給中國游客。”
WeChat, the popular Chinese messaging app owned by technology group Tencent, launched its payment service, WeChat Pay, in the UK on Wednesday. It is hoping that more shops like Ms Peonia’s will use it to target Chinese consumers, who last year spent £513m in the UK, according to Visit Britain, the tourism body.
中國科技集團(tuán)騰訊旗下廣受歡迎的消息應(yīng)用微信(WeChat)本周三在英國推出了微信支付(WeChat Pay)服務(wù)。微信希望有更多店鋪能像皮奧尼亞的店鋪那樣，使用微信支付來吸引中國消費(fèi)者。根據(jù)旅游機(jī)構(gòu)Visit Britain的統(tǒng)計(jì)，去年中國消費(fèi)者在英國花費(fèi)了5.13億英鎊。
As part of a modernisation push by its owners, Camden Market will ask more than 1,000 shops and restaurants to sign up to the app over the next four months, so that people with Chinese bank accounts linked to WeChat can shop in the market using their smartphones.
卡姆登市場(chǎng)將要求逾1000家商店和餐廳在接下來4個(gè)月里與微信簽訂合作協(xié)議，這樣微信上綁定了中國的銀行賬戶的人就能使用智能手機(jī)在卡姆登市場(chǎng)購物。這是卡姆登市場(chǎng)的所有者推動(dòng)該市場(chǎng)現(xiàn)代化的一部分。
The idea is to replicate a system that Alipay, the rival Chinese payment app, has already implemented in the Harrods and Selfridges department stores. “In terms of the Chinese market it just offers a very good opportunity to us,” said Ceri Davies, operations director at Camden Market. “They’re currently super attracted by the likes of Selfridges and Harrods and the more ways there are of paying, the better.”
這是為了復(fù)制微信支付的對(duì)手支付寶(Alipay)在哈羅德百貨(Harrods)和塞爾福里奇百貨(Selfridges)鋪設(shè)的支付系統(tǒng)。“在中國消費(fèi)者市場(chǎng)方面，這給了我們絕佳的機(jī)會(huì)。”卡姆登市場(chǎng)的運(yùn)營總監(jiān)凱里•戴維斯(Ceri Davies)說，“他們現(xiàn)在很受像塞爾福里奇百貨和哈羅德百貨這樣的購物場(chǎng)所吸引，支付方式越多越好。”
Tencent has already rolled out its payment platform — known in China as WeixinPay — around the world but this is its first foray into the UK. It is mainly targeting Chinese tourists, who can use their phones to pay while on holiday.
騰訊已經(jīng)在全球各地推廣其支付平臺(tái)微信支付，但這是其首次進(jìn)軍英國。微信支付在英國主要面向中國游客，這樣他們就可以在度假時(shí)使用手機(jī)支付。
It launched its payments system a decade after Alipay — which is run by Ant financial, an affiliate of Tencent’s biggest rival, Alibaba — but has since taken a 37 per cent slice of China’s market. The WeChat messaging app is ubiquitous in the country and has 980m monthly active users around the world. Users outside the home markets are mainly overseas Chinese or those with business or other connections in the mainland, for whom it is often the only way to communicate.
騰訊推出微信支付的時(shí)間要比支付寶晚10年，但自推出以來微信支付已占據(jù)中國市場(chǎng)37%的份額。支付寶的運(yùn)營者則是騰訊最大的競爭對(duì)手之一阿里巴巴(Alibaba)旗下的關(guān)聯(lián)公司螞蟻金服(Ant financial)。作為一款消息應(yīng)用，微信在國內(nèi)得到廣泛使用，其在世界范圍內(nèi)的月度活躍用戶數(shù)量達(dá)到9.8億。中國市場(chǎng)以外的微信用戶主要是海外的中國人，以及與中國內(nèi)地有商業(yè)或其他往來的人士。對(duì)后者而言，微信通常是與內(nèi)地聯(lián)系的唯一方式。
“Our primary focus is to better serve Chinese outbound tourists,” Tencent said.
騰訊表示：“我們的首要重點(diǎn)是更好地服務(wù)中國的出境游客。”
WeChat’s messaging service is one of a number of rivals to more popular services, such as WhatsApp.
微信的消息服務(wù)是WhatsApp等更受歡迎的消息服務(wù)的競爭對(duì)手之一。
In Camden Market, shops that use WeChat will spend between 0.6 per cent and 2 per cent on commissions to SafeCharge, the London-listed payments company that will handle the transactions with Tencent. For smaller shops the costs will be greater than the 1.35 per cent paid to iZettle, the payments provider but, according to David Avgi, chief executive of SafeCharge, the idea is for shops to build their reputations with Chinese shoppers.
在卡姆登市場(chǎng)，使用微信支付的店鋪需要向倫敦上市支付公司SafeCharge支付0.6%到2%的傭金，SafeCharge將處理與騰訊的交易。對(duì)于規(guī)模較小的店鋪而言，使用微信支付的傭金花費(fèi)會(huì)超過支付服務(wù)提供商iZettle向它們收取的1.35%的傭金費(fèi)率。但SafeCharge首席執(zhí)行官戴維•阿夫吉(David Avgi)表示，使用微信支付是為了讓這些店鋪在中國購物者中建立聲譽(yù)。
“For some of the retailers it’s a very attractive market, Chinese shoppers or foreigners sending money to Chinese accounts,” he said. “The plan is not just Camden. Selfridges, Harrods, they’re all next.”
“對(duì)一些零售商而言，這是一個(gè)非常有吸引力的市場(chǎng):中國消費(fèi)者或者向中國賬戶匯款的外國人。”他說，“這個(gè)計(jì)劃不僅關(guān)乎卡姆登。塞爾福里奇百貨和哈羅德百貨，它們都在計(jì)劃的下一步中。”
Currently, 10 per cent of Camden Market’s visitors are Chinese but the figure has grown rapidly, says Mr Davies. The proportion in September last year was only 5 per cent.
卡姆登市場(chǎng)的運(yùn)營總監(jiān)戴維斯表示，目前到訪卡姆登市場(chǎng)的游客中有10%是中國人，這個(gè)比例經(jīng)歷了快速增長。去年9月這個(gè)比例僅為5%。
Some shopkeepers are sceptical: “I’ve never heard of anyone coming and asking to pay by WeChat,” says Davey, who works in a fashion boutique in Camden market. “To be honest there aren’t even so many Chinese people here and, if there are and we tell them we don’t have something, they would find another way to pay.”
一些店主抱懷疑態(tài)度：“我從來沒聽說有人走進(jìn)店里要求用微信支付。”在卡姆登市場(chǎng)的一家時(shí)尚精品店工作的戴維(Davey)說，“老實(shí)說，這兒都沒有那么多中國人，就算有，如果我們告訴他們我們沒有某種支付方式，他們會(huì)用別的方式支付。”
Additional reporting by Louise Lucas in Hong Kong 路易絲•盧卡斯(Louise Lucas)香港補(bǔ)充報(bào)道
