Beggars in China now accepting donations via mobile payments and QR codes

Don’t have any spare change? No problem – beggars in China now accept alms transferred via mobile payments by scanning QR codes with smartphones.

One case in point is Jinan, a city in Shandong province in eastern China, where beggars frequenting popular tourist areas like the Wangfu Pool have turned to mobile payments in order to increase their chances of receiving donations from the general public.

This would indicate that the beggars would need to be able to afford to have a mobile phone. According to Chinese state media, this is not as uncommon as you’d think.

In the case of the beggar seen in Jinan, state media reported that the man was apparently suffering from a mental illness, and that his family had made the QR code to help him.

However, Chinese digital marketing firm China Channel claims that the practice of QR code begging is not merely altruistic. The firm claims that many of the beggars they encountered in Beijing are actually being paid by local businesses and startups to promote QR codes and entice passersby to scan them.

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