BEIJING, Sept. 7 -- China UnionPay will offer gift incentives to its most active bankcard users to cash in on overseas spending by its cardholders during the upcoming National Day holiday.

China UnionPay, China's sole operator of a national cross-bank transaction network, announced the incentives in Shanghai yesterday to lure more Chinese customers travelling abroad.

Transactions made by Chinese tourists abroad through the UnionPay network currently account for a fraction of all overseas spending by Chinese travellers. Many tourists choose MasterCard or Visa credit cards, or cash.

The gift incentives up for grabs include up to 4,900 yuan (US$612.5) worth of coupons for tour packages run by designated travel agencies. To be eligible for the gifts customers will need to register for the competition.

Smaller incentives such as data storage devices and festival decorations will be given away to cardholders with transactions of up to 5,000 yuan (US$625) made between September 20 and November 20 in countries where UnionPay is established.

China UnionPay expects transactions worth millions of yuan to be made through its network by Chinese tourists travelling abroad in the week-long National Day holiday beginning on October 1.

During this year's week-long May Day holiday, 160,000 ATM and POS transactions totalling 620 million yuan (US$77.5 million) were made through the UnionPay network by Chinese tourists overseas a surge of 105.9 per cent and 72.9 per cent respectively over the same period last year.

"Our analysis of the consumption habits of Chinese outbound tourists showed that they tend to purchase expensive items such as top-brand jewellery, watches, clothes and souvenirs with distinct local features," UnionPay said in a statement yesterday.

UnionPay is offering card users discounts in conjunction with top-brand hotels and shops in a dozen of the most popular destinations such as Sheraton Grande Walkerhill Hotel in Seoul, South Korea, and Galeries Lafayette department store in Paris, France.

The number of Chinese outbound tourists exceeded 10 million in 2000 and has been growing at a rate of more than 10 per cent annually, according to a report published by China's Social Science Academic Press.

Most of the outbound tourism occurred during the May Day and National Day holidays and during the Spring Festival, the report found.

There are not yet any official statistics on the spending habits of outbound tourists, but some offshore surveys show the level of spending of Chinese tourists overtakes the average level of residents in the tourist destinations.

According to the report, Chinese tourists spend an average HK$4,370 (US$560) when travelling to Hong Kong, and US$5,500 on a trip to the United States.

It said total spending by Chinese outbound tourists is likely to exceed US$20 billion this year.

(Source: China Daily)