(Yicai Global) March 31 -- Alibaba Group Holding's Ant Financial payment arm and Industrial and Commercial Bank of China have started to share one QR code for payments to merchants to allow them to more conveniently collect money, according to a statement today by Hangzhou-based Ant Financial.

Sellers can receive payments through the same quick response code with users using either Alipay or ICBC's e-banking app.

A vendor previously had to have separate QR codes for Alipay, Union Pay and Tencent Holding's popular WeChat messaging and payment app to process payments.

Alipay and ICBC, which is the world's largest bank in assets, began collaborating as early as March 2005 to offer online payment services. ICBC was the first Chinese bank to partner with Ant Financial's Alipay service to offer online payments.

Editor: Ben Armour