J.P. Morgan has launched its E-Customs Payment Solution, making it the first foreign bank in China to offer a solution that fully digitizes and automates cross-border payments of goods. The solution solves common pain points associated with the manual nature of such transactions.

Importers in China are required to provide supporting documents to their banks prior to making payments to overseas suppliers, a process that is often labor-intensive and time-consuming.

With the E-Customs Payment Solution, J.P. Morgan’s clients in China will only be required to send the payment instructions with a linked customs declaration number.

Using Application Programming Interface (API) technology, J.P. Morgan’s E-Customs Payment Solution will then retrieve the relevant customs declaration status in detail from the local authorities via the Shanghai International Trade Single Window in real time and process the payments automatically. Clients will be able to keep track of their payments through J.P. Morgan Access® at all times.

“J.P. Morgan’s E-Customs Payment Solution has significantly improved our operational efficiency with time and resource savings and reduced manual inaccuracies while keeping our business fully compliant. We have been able to make comprehensive business decisions from a treasury perspective as a result,” says Jason Tan, head of Treasury & Credit Management, Asia, Continental AG, which is currently implementing E-Customs Payment Solution as it looks to fully digitize its cross-border payment processes.

“We are pleased to roll out an innovative solution that enables the full digitization of cross-border payments, which we view as a milestone and one that addresses our clients’ specific needs amid a rapidly-evolving treasury landscape,” says Rani Gu, head of Treasury Services, China and head of Treasury Services Product, Greater China, Wholesale Payments, J.P. Morgan.