Can you set up Alipay with a non-Chinese bank account or card?
It works great for Chinese people and foreign residents of the PRC who have a bank account. However, my experience as a tourist was that it was impossible to link my US credit card using the PRC version of the app downloaded while in China.
You cannot link foreign cards to Alipay account. Best way is to ask Chinese colleagues to transfer you Yuan and you pay them via cash. You can then use the wallet amount in shops.
Yes I tried recently and it seemed impossible without a bank account. You can link a foreign card but not actually use it for normal payments. You may be able to use it only on tabao or something. WeChat pay is not usable at all without a Chinese bank card.
We hat payments used to require a Chinese bank account, so we're essentially inaccessible to foreigners. This is secondhand knowledge, I've never used it, but I have heard this has changed. Perhaps since the account was created while this restriction was in place, the option was never enabled?
It's still not possible. If you have a foreigner WeChat account it's possible to enable the pay feature, but not possible to sign up for it without a Chinese bank card.
It also appears if you somehow end up with a positive balance (e.g by receiving a red packet). I haven't tested whether you can actually spend that balance without having linked a Chinese bank account, though.
