Paying with cash in China

[Lu]

SInce I heard all kinds of scary stories about this topic... 'You can't pay with cash anymore, only Alipay or Wechat!' 'Nobody takes cash!' 'When people from my company go to China for business, they have to have a Chinese person with them at all times to pay for things!'

 

I'm in China at the moment and so far virtually everyone has accepted cash. I ask every time to make sure, and occasionally someone is relieved we have the exact amount, but still. Places that have accepted cash include: the sim card counter at the airport, metro service counter (Beijing and Shanghai), train ticket counter at the station, major tourist destinations (Yuyuan Garden, Forbidden City etc), restaurants (tiny, small and medium-sized; low-end and middle-end), coffee places, supermarket, fruit & vegetable shops, souvenir shops, a small shop selling shoes and suitcases, a book stall in Ditan Park, a regular book shop, shops at Liulichang, the kuaidi guy (not all kuaidi companies, I think, but this one did)... I'll edit this post if I think of more.

 

We're paying hotels by credit card and we haven't taken a taxi, so I don't know how those would go. Based on my experience so far I think regular taxis would take cash, I'd just ask first.

 

From the top of my head, there was one (1) restaurant that really needed everything by phone, but when I explained I couldn't, the waiter just ordered for me on his phone and I paid him the cash.

 

The fact that everyone else pays with their phone does make it even more impossible to win the battle for the bill when eating with friends at a restaurant. The friends pay before the bill even gets near the table.

[Jive Turkey]

My family and I took trips to Suzhou and Hainan this year from Hong Kong. We had set up WeChat pay in HK before departing. The annoying thing about that is we seem to only be able to pay RMB through WeChat from our credits cards, and WeChat charges 2.5% extra on all transactions. We can only do cash top ups on our HK WeChat and Alipay accounts with HK$, and that is not useable across the border. 
 

I’d say that you often can pay cash, but to do so creates inconvenience. In some cases, like taking a taxi, cash just isn’t accepted unless you have exact change. Using cash in restaurants can slow things down.

 

The thing that I find to be a bigger hassle now is that many services and purchases require a mainland mobile number registered under one’s real name. Booking a car/taxi was only possible by doing it through our Taobao accounts (DiDi requires a mainland number). Booking museum tickets online was impossible as it required a real-name-verified mainland phone number. I think we also hit a brick wall trying to book high speed rail tickets online, and had to get them at the station. I’ve heard that China Mobile HK SIMs include cheap roaming on the mainland, and more importantly, include a second mainland number registered to one’s name which can be used for anything requiring a local number. I might switch to China Mobile for my next mobile contract. 

[vellocet]

Yeah, they can take cash. They just can't make change.  Be prepared to accept your change in Wechat from someone's personal phone. You'll also get some exacerbated looks while they try to figure out what to do with you. Best if you carry a little purse of small change with you. I still carry my money clip. 

 

Anywhere with a cash register isn't a problem - grocery store, hotel, chain convenience stores.  I still use cash and bank cards out of a stubborn resistance to be the nail that sticks out. 

[Flickserve]

I just visited Chengdu. Cash is usable though you might have problems with the change. Therefore have plenty of small notes available. I saw an old lady pay for her groceries using cash in the supermarket. 
 

From my own telephone provider in HK, I paid a surcharge of HK$18 per month on my service plan to get a mainland phone number. I set up a mainland WeChat. The mainland phone number came in useful when ordering through the didi app and the driver is trying to look for you. 
 

My colleagues did say that one of the China mobile service carriers based in HK can issue a SIM card with a mainland number for HK $5 for local HK residents. You have to state specifically that you want the $5 option and you probably will get offered other plans along the way. 
 

I bought a 33GB data card from a SIM card shop

in Wanchai. Cost ~ hk$290 with a six month validity. That card allowed me to still access apps that are normally blocked in China. 
 

Although I linked my mainland WeChat to credit card, it wouldn’t work for payments. Oddly enough, it would work if I ordered a driver through didi- you select the option to pay the driver on didi using WeChat. Didi paying the driver wouldn’t work when I tried to pay using my HK Alipay 
 

I set up my HK Alipay and attached a credit card. I also added hkd cash into the Alipay within hk. It was successful in paying bills in China debiting my hkd. I didn’t spend enough to see whether it would later deduct from credit card if there was no cash left. 

[Jim]

Still fairly easy around here in the villages and small towns as a lot of the old folk stick with cash, and there's even some things where only cash is accepted, such as when we change the gas bottle for the cooking range or paying the out-of-towner surcharge to the village committee for our refuse collection. 

[anonymoose]

I went to China in August this year. I did not have an issue using cash anywhere. However, it is definitely not the default anymore. When it comes to paying, the usual question is 'Weixin or Zhifubao?'.

[suMMit]

A couple months ago I went to a wedding. We gave a 红包 with 666 rmb, so I had to go to the ATM for 700 and then a small store to get 100 broken down into 66. As I was walking to the atm I was trying to remember the colors of the bank notes, I could only remember the 100 was pink, and some other note was green but that's about it. I couldn't decide if the was a 20 rmb note.

[Lu]

On 11/3/2023 at 12:36 AM, vellocet said:

Yeah, they can take cash. They just can't make change.  Be prepared to accept your change in Wechat from someone's personal phone. You'll also get some exacerbated looks while they try to figure out what to do with you.

This isn't my experience so far. I ask if I can pay in cash, I usually get an immediate 'sure', occasionally a short shuffling to find the change, and very rarely (twice so far in three weeks, I think) a pained look and a 'only if you have the exact amount...' Haven't received change in Wechat so far, nor requests to get it that way. (I don't think I could receive it either.)

 

Booking museums is a mixed bag. Didn't manage to book tickets for the Summer Palace, the app didn't accept our names as real names. Fortunately, we could just buy a ticket at the gate and in we went. For the Forbidden City, the official website instructs foreign visitors to send their info to an email address, bookingticket@dpm.org.cn. This actually works and we got in no problem. For the Nanjing Museum, we just turned up, turns out we had to make a reservation, which we could fortunately make on the spot, the app worked with our passport numbers. I asked in which order I should input the names: 姓 first, then 名 or the other way around? Doesn't matter, said the lady at the service counter. Turns out it did matter that I wrote the letters for our passport number in lower case instead of upper case, but she sighed and gave us a ticket anyway after I promised to be more careful next time.

[anonymoose]

On 11/5/2023 at 12:47 PM, Lu said:

For the Forbidden City, the official website instructs foreign visitors to send their info to an email address

 

I'd say this is a bigger issue for foreign visitors than paying with cash. Since you need to show ID for most things these days, and most places aren't geared up for anything other than Chinese ID cards, this can present obstacles for foreigners. For example, at many Chinese airports, the self check-in machines will not accept passports. Therefore, as a foreigner, you are obliged to queue up at check-in to get a boarding pass (and whilst you can request, you cannot select your own seat).

 

On the other hand, it can have its advantages. If you take a train, most people have to queue up at the gate to be let onto the platform. You have to scan your Chinese ID to get through the gate. As there is no automatic option for foreigners, you have to go through a manual check, and usually there is no queue at the manual gate, so you get to be the first onto the platform (not that that has any benefit, but at least you don't have to put up with the pushing and shoving in the long queue).

[vellocet]

'Round here the gates at the train station have a scanner to accept passports.  Not sure about the local airport here but Shanghai Pudong definitely has scanners.  

[MadmaxxxMaSiDe]

It seems to be rather easy to link a foreign credit card with one‘s weixin wallet. Any security concerns?

[Lu]

On 11/5/2023 at 10:57 PM, anonymoose said:

I'd say this is a bigger issue for foreign visitors than paying with cash.

Yeah, it can be a bit of a pain. It's sometimes impossible or a lot of hassle to get things done in an app; even if everything goes well at a museum or so, you still need to first go to some other counter to get your ticket, instead of just swiping in like the Chinese.

 

What bothers me far more than the hassle is that I need to show my passport everywhere in the first place. What earthly business is it of the Summer Palace/Forbidden City/whatever museum who I am, when I was born and where I came from? Can't I just be a tourist, one of many, anonymous? Same for train tickets, actually. I know the Dutch public transport system also makes it unattractive and/or a hassle to travel anonymously, and that bothers me too.

 

But well. I'm touristing moral-less these few weeks. If I let things get to me I won't have a good time.

[Kenny同志]

Refusing cash is illegal. In almost all cases, people accept cash. 

[Kenny同志]

I've just read through your posts. Having to show your ID everywhere you go is painful to me, too.

 

I really hate 實名制 for everything because it's not only kind of a hassle but deprives me of my privacy. I feel they are watching me all the time and that really makes me uncomfortable.  

[Lu]

It's funny: The day after I returned home, I was at a large chain cinema and bought a cup of coffee. As I got out a few coins, the lady behind the counter said that sorry, no cash, just bank cards. (And it's legal here in the Netherlands to do that, I just looked it up.) The cashless country isn't China.

[amytheorangutan]

I'm reviving this thread as I'm going for holiday this October. Yay! Does Wechat pay work for foreigners with foreign credit/bank card? Last time I tried to do this I couldn't, that was maybe 2-3 years ago when I tried to set it up to be able to send 红包 to my friend. Because there is so much to do to set up I thought I would ask first before going through with the whole process of scanning ID etc. 

[Jan Finster]

Wechat worked for me 100% of the time (assuming you have internet). O Cash was zero problem too, even in remote places (Gansu, Qinghai) 

[vellocet]

On 7/18/2024 at 4:50 PM, amytheorangutan said:

I'm reviving this thread as I'm going for holiday this October. Yay! Does Wechat pay work for foreigners with foreign credit/bank card? Last time I tried to do this I couldn't, that was maybe 2-3 years ago when I tried to set it up to be able to send 红包 to my friend. Because there is so much to do to set up I thought I would ask first before going through with the whole process of scanning ID etc. 

You can pay for touristy things, like hotel, restaurants etc.  You cannot transfer money to Chinese people or send hongbao.  If you need to do that it's off to the cash machine to use your foreign card then give to the other  in person.  Or deposit into your Chinese bank account, after which you can use Wechat transfers as usual. 

[amytheorangutan]

On 7/20/2024 at 8:28 AM, vellocet said:

You can pay for touristy things, like hotel, restaurants etc. 

Thank you so much! Can I confirm, do you think I can use it for all kind of transactions, small vendors or street vendors etc or would it only allow me to use it at bigger establishments like hotels, department stores etc? I probably won’t use it to send money but would like it to be my main method of payment if possible. Or do you think AliPay is better overall for foreigners? 

[vellocet]

Wechat vs. Alipay, to be honest I've never really noticed any difference.  I use Wechat as a matter of habit. 

pro TIP: long-press the icon on your (Android) screen and choose "Money" or "scan" to go directly to pay and skip fumbling with several screens of choosing options.  

Small transactions with vendors are no problem.  I get the idea they want to prevent money transfers from abroad to Chinese people.