Shanghai

DONG Ximiao was buying a meal at KFC in Hangzhou on a recent Sunday and pulled out his phone to pay, like everyone does in China, when the cashier asked: "Alipay or WeChat Pay?" The problem was, Mr Dong wanted to use Apple Pay for the 36 yuan (S$7.30) bill, but the cashier told him she had never handled transactions before and wasn't sure whether it was accepted at the fried-chicken outlet.

"I knew for sure KFC stores accept it," said Mr Dong, 39, a researcher at Renmin University. "So I ended up teaching her step-by-step how to complete the transaction, and she was surprised at how easy it was."