Scoot Removes Payment Processing Fees Globally

Photo Source: @FlyScoot EU

Aligning with its vision to make travel accessible to all, Scoot, the low cost arm of Singapore Airlines, has announced the removal of payment processing fees globally for all bookings made through its direct channels, with immediate effect.

The payment processing fee is a convenience fee applied during the payment process to support the implementation and advancement of the payment infrastructure, and for the continuous maintenance of a secure payment environment.

The carrier currently offers a comprehensive range of payment options across its network of 67 cities in 17 countries and territories.

This includes global payment methods such as Apple Pay, Credit Card (American Express, JCB, MasterCard, UnionPay, Visa), Google Pay and PayPal, and local payment methods such as AXS and PayNow for customers in Singapore, POLi for customers in Australia, WeChat Pay and Alipay for customers in China, DragonPay for customers in the Philippines, Konbini for customers in Japan, and Momo for customers in Vietnam.

“When Scoot first started, we offered a limited range of payment methods at a higher implementation and maintenance cost. As we expanded globally and heard our customers’ feedback, we took advantage of advances in payment technology to implement many more payment methods to improve our customers’ experience,” said Scoot Chief Executive Officer Lee Lik Hsin.

The evolution of payment systems over the years, driven by technological improvements, has helped to significantly defray the associated costs required to support and maintain the payment infrastructure.

“In order to pass on the savings to our customers as our costs came down, we have since March 2018 progressively removed payment processing fees in selected markets. Now, we are ready to do away with it globally,” Lee Lik Hsin added.

More recently, in August 2019, the fees for selected local payment methods, including AXS (for customers in Singapore) and Konbini (for customers in Japan), were removed. Momo, an e-wallet and mobile payment app launched in end August 2019 for customers in Vietnam, also has zero payment processing fees.

Asian Aviation is the general sales agent of Scoot and Singapore Airlines in Greece and Cyprus.