Unionpay signs agreement with Nets to expand acceptance across Nordics

UnionPay, the card scheme with the world’s largest cardholder base, has announced that it has signed a new market development agreement for the Nordics with Nets.

The agreement will enable contactless acceptance throughout Nets’ Nordic merchant portfolio, adding a significant increase on top of the existing over 100,000 POS terminals in Denmark, Sweden and Norway.

Acceptance will also be extended to more than 6,000 ATMs in Denmark, Sweden, Norway and Finland, resulting in almost full ATM acceptance across the entire Nordic region.

UnionPay and Nets also expect to reach a new agreement to extend UnionPay’s existing POS merchant acceptance rate in Finland.

As international travel recovers, UnionPay cardholders visiting the Nordics will be able to use their card or mobile phone to pay at POS terminals by contactless.

The Nordic region has been an increasingly popular destination for UnionPay cardholders in recent years, with over 1.5 million travelling in 2019.

“We are excited to be offering a significantly larger number of our merchant clients the opportunity to accept UnionPay,” says Robert Hoffmann, CEO Merchant Services Nets.

“Expanding the array of payment means at the point of sale enables merchants to better accommodate the payment preferences of their customers which is known to be an important revenue driver.

Our partnership is particularly important for merchants located in the many popular tourist destinations across the Nordic region. As UnionPay cardholders start to return, merchants will be well set to provide them with a preferred and easy payment option.”

With over billions of cards accumulatively issued worldwide, UnionPay is the card payment organisation with the world’s largest cardholder base. Meanwhile, its global network has extended to 180 countries and regions with issuance in 70 countries and regions.