Paying by a Lift of a Hand

Beijing subway line now allows passengers to travel by scanning the palms of their hands

On May 5th WeChat (微信), China’s most popular messaging, social media and payment application announced the launch of the "palm payment" function, a part of the pilot program first launched on Daxing Airport Express subway line (北京地铁大兴机场线). The subway line connects Caoqiao station (草桥站) with the Beijing Daxing International Airport (北京大兴国际机场). The program allows passengers to register their biometric data by scanning the palm, connecting the scan with their WeChat account and completing the authorization, thus making it possible to pay for the subway ride by literally lifting a hand.

Despite certain advantages over widely used QR code payment, such as convenience and being able to pay for goods and services in case the phone has been lost or out of battery, many people are concerned with possible information leakage.

While face scan is not an unknown concept in China, particularly in first tier cities, palm scan is relatively new.

Wang Peng (王鹏), a researcher at the Beijing Academy of Social Sciences (北京社科院), explained to the reporters that there is actually not much difference between the two. If anything, from the perspective of recognition rate, the current palm recognition rate is higher than face recognition rate, which makes it safer and is more "elderly-friendly".

According to Tencent Holdings Ltd. ( 腾讯), subway palm payment is conducted just to test the waters. The company behind WeChat revealed that more application scenarios are planned for the future. Palm of a hand will most likely replace membership cards, campus cards, transportation cards, personal QR codes and more. Merchants are gradually joining the experiment, even though according to Wang Peng, at the moment it is not realistic to expect palm payment to be used on a large scale. One of the reasons is the cost of equipment being too high to be popularized among small and medium-sized merchants. In the long run, he however, believes that palm payment may become mainstream.

According to the "Report on the 2021 Mobile Payment User Questionnaire Survey"《关于2021年移动支付用户问卷调查的报告》released by the Payment and Clearing Association of China (中国支付清算协会发布的) in April 4, 2022, each of 5 participants (20.2%) does not accept the use of biometric technology for identity and transaction verification.

Sources: 央视网，新华网, Chinadaily, 小红书

Categories: China Market, Payment, Market Research, China Market Opportunity