China UnionPay establishes agreement with Portugal’s Unicre

Chinese bank card company UnionPay has reached an agreement with Portugal’s Unicre enabling Chinese cardholders to use their cards in Portugal through the Portuguese automatic payment system, Unicre said in a statement.
Until the establishment of this agreement signed Friday between the two companies, Chinese tourists had to subscribe to other payment services such as Visa or MasterCard in order to pay for their purchases in Portugal.
The agreement, due to be put in place on 1 July, enables UnionPay cards to be used for purchases at over 45,000 points of sale in the country, using Redunicre automatic payment terminals, the largest network of its kind in Portugal.
The Chinese company estimates that at the end of 2015, its cards will be accepted at around 80 percent of Portuguese establishments such as hotels, restaurants and shops.
UnionPay was founded in 2002, has about 4.6 billion cards issued, allows for inter-bank and inter-regional payments with cards issued by China’s commercial banks and has agreements with similar companies in over 150 countries, so that its customers can use bank cards when traveling.
In 2008, Portuguese state bank Caixa Geral de Depósitos signed an agreement with the UnionPay, so that holders of Chinese cards could withdraw cash at any ATM in the Portuguese Multibanco system.  MDT/Macauhub