Mastercard Unveils Bill Qkr to Streamline and Enhance the Way Bills Are Paid

Mastercard has launched Bill Qkr to help merchants, acquirers, payment facilitators (PayFacs) and service providers (PSPs) grow into new markets and unlock new opportunities. The solution has been designed to simplify customer payment processes, enhance trust, and improve the success of collections – meeting the needs of customers wherever they are. It offers flexible, cost-effective, and efficient options for participating customers. Today, 89% of people have paid or are planning to pay their bills using digital tools, covering expenses from insurance to utilities and TV/phone packages. Despite this, several challenges remain, including a cumbersome user experience, limited options for card payments and wider security concerns. Many billers, including global telcos like AT&T and digital platforms like Adobe, already embrace card payments and benefit from lower fraud and reduced payment declines. However, to advance on these benefits for more billers and consumers, Mastercard today unveiled Bill Qkr, a comprehensive solution that pairs Mastercard’s payments expertise with its leading technology. The solution solves for a range of common pain-points:

• Tokenization can allow cards to be securely stored on a merchant’s site for recurring payments.
• When a card expires, the merchant can be securely updated with a new token, allowing future transactions to flow seamlessly.
• For fixed, recurring payments, such as monthly insurance premiums, billers can automatically submit ongoing invoices, enhancing efficiencies.
• For bills that change month-to-month, consumers can use QR codes on their paper bills or online statements, simply click a button and use their saved payment credentials to pay.
• Guest checkout can be made simple and easy with Click to Pay, bringing the same convenience that people experience in the physical world online.
• Merchants can experience greater peace-of-mind by accepting card payments, with quick and guaranteed payment, eliminating concerns over collections.
• Merchants can achieve higher approval rates and deliver an enhanced cardholder experience by leveraging intelligent guidance to prevent addressable declined payments.

In addition to this end-to-end digital experience, participating customers will benefit from access to Mastercard’s wider base of partners to deliver a range of innovation services. This includes product development, design sprints and prototype design, as well as early access to new product pilots and ongoing implementation support. An initial set of strategic partners across Africa, Asia Pacific, and Latin America will leverage Mastercard Bill Qkr:

• 2C2P, which offers the easyBills platform in Southeast Asia for easy consumer access to digital goods and services, including utility bill payments, mobile top-ups, tax payments, and gift cards, will enable recurring Mastercard payments on the easyBills+ application in Thailand, bringing greater convenience and timely payments for its users.
• AXS, a leading bill payment aggregator in Singapore catering to the bill payment needs of both consumers and organizations on a multi-channel ubiquitous platform. Together with Mastercard, AXS has launched multiple pioneering initiatives such as tokenized payments, rewards programs, and Mastercard sonic branding. A new addition to this list of initiatives will be the capability to automate recurring bill payments on AXS mobile app.
• CardUp (a subsidiary company of Funding Societies), a payments solutions provider serving Singapore, Malaysia and Hong Kong focusing on uncarded verticals such as rental, education and taxes, will leverage Mastercard’s recurring payment capabilities to offer a better customer experience.
• Curacel, an AI-powered infrastructure provider in Africa, supporting over 30 insurers across 10 markets, will integrate digital payment acceptance into their platform.
• FitBank, a leading Brazilian payment technology provider serving over 12,000 billers across Latin America, is expanding its services with Mastercard’s tokenization and Secure Card on File technology. This will enable secure and seamless digital payments through global chat platforms, offering more than just bill payments and enhancing the overall payment experience.

“Card-based payments are chosen daily by consumers, yet they remain significantly underutilized for bill payments,” said Jennifer Marriner, executive vice president, Global Acceptance at Mastercard. “With Mastercard Bill Qkr, we’re bringing our cutting-edge payment technologies together with our longstanding, global approach to collaboration. This allows us to not only innovate in bill payments for our customers, but also to create better ways to transact and strengthen trust for the wider ecosystem.” Mastercard Bill Qkr is live and available globally. To learn more, visit: https://www.mastercard.com/global/en/business/large-enterprise/bill-qkr.html. “As a proud partner of Mastercard since 2014, we're excited to strengthen our collaboration with the introduction of the recurring payments feature in Thailand. With Mastercard’s continued support and innovation, we are confident our easyBills+ application will offer Thai users’ greater convenience and ease. We look forward to expanding this partnership across the region to drive mutual success,” said Piyachart Ratanaprasartporn, chief executive officer, 2C2P Thailand. "Mastercard has been pivotal in our growth across regions, both regionally and globally,” said Henry Mascot, co-founder and chief executive officer at Curacel. “Their support will enable us to scale our payment across insurance verticals like health and life, auto and travel. This will help us better serve our customers and expand into new markets across Europe, the Middle East and Africa and beyond.” "Mastercard has been a key partner in transforming the bill payment experience for our customers – business owners and individuals,” said Kah Meng Wong, group chief operating officer, Funding Societies. “This collaboration will allow us to enhance the payment experience for consumers and improve collections for our billers, making it easier and safer for our customers to manage recurring bill payments." “We are bringing an innovative bill payment solution to the market in partnership with Mastercard, driven by our deep understanding of the challenges billers face in payment reconciliation,” said Manuel Steremberg, head of innovation at FitBank. “Our goal is to provide the best customer journey by simplifying the bill payment experience for consumers while optimizing operational efficiency and accuracy for billers. This collaboration reflects our shared commitment to transforming outdated processes and delivering a solution that addresses both consumer and biller needs in a seamless, efficient manner."