(Yicai) July 31 -- The proxy witness bank account opening service for residents of Hong Kong and Macao, which simplifies opening an account in the Chinese mainland, has been expanded to the six cities that it did not already cover in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macau Greater Bay Area.

The service is now available at selected banks in Foshan, Huizhou, Dongguan, Zhongshan, Jiangmen, and Zhaoqing, according to the Guangdong provincial branch of the People's Bank of China, the country's central bank. It was previously available only in Guangzhou, Shenzhen, and Zhuhai.

“The proxy witness service provides a more convenient payment option for Hong Kong and Macau residents studying, working, and living in the mainland, and promotes financial connectivity in the Greater Bay Area," an official from the PBOC branch noted.

The service enables residents of Hong Kong and Macao to open bank accounts in the Chinese mainland without leaving the special administrative regions as their local bank acts as their witness so that a bank in the mainland can then set up an account for them remotely.

“I can open a mainland bank account at a lender's branch near my home,” said a Hong Konger who opened one at the Bank of China Tower in Central yesterday. “I just need to link my bank card when I go to the mainland, and I can pay as conveniently as local residents.”

The PBoC’s Guangdong branch began piloting the service in 2019, enabling Hong Kong and Macau residents to link their new mainland bank cards to mobile payment apps in the mainland for seamless payments and convenient shopping across the mainland.

Bank of China, Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, China Construction Bank, China Merchants Bank, Bank of East Asia, Bank of Communications, HSBC, and Standard Chartered have all been approved for the service. Some 472,000 such personal bank accounts have been opened as of June 30, with cumulative transactions exceeding CNY40 billion (USD5.6 billion).

Editors: Tang Shihua, Martin Kadiev