October 1979.

In the late 1970s, Zhang Lianli was in charge of international business at the Bank of China. He heard the word "credit card" for the first time and asked his foreign colleagues for advice. After nearly a month of investigation, he wrote a report called "The Origin of Credit Cards" and handed it to his superiors.

After careful market research, Bank of China decided to introduce credit cards. In 1979, Bank of China Guangdong Branch took the lead in signing an agency credit card business agreement with a foreign bank.

Extended information:

As the only foreign exchange bank designated by the country at that time, Bank of China was responsible for handling currency exchange business for foreign tourists; Bank of China Guangdong Branch successively cooperated with HSBC Bank and American Express Company Signed a contract to act as an agent for credit card cash withdrawal business.

After six years of practice and accumulation as an agent for foreign credit cards, Bank of China has fully mastered the credit card business process and operating model, and decided to start issuing credit cards on its own. In 1985, Bank of China Zhuhai Branch issued the first domestic RMB credit card - BOC Card. In 1986, Bank of China issued the first credit card that could be used nationwide - Great Wall Card.

Issuing a card is only the first step, using facilities and channels is the key. At first, domestic merchants did not accept new payment methods. There were not many merchants that could use credit cards, and there were no POS machines in the country, so it was inconvenient to swipe cards.

Xie Xuefeng, a member of the bank card preparation team at the time, recalled: “At that time, the process of using bank cards was relatively complicated. Before customers used the card to make purchases, merchants had to call the bank to verify the card number and customer name before using it. In addition, there were no computers for typing at the time, so everything had to be written by hand, so paying with a card was actually much slower than paying directly with cash."

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