Flywire adds payment options for Chinese and Indian payers

Flywire has added 22 new payment methods from China and India to ease the challenges associated with international education payments.

Flywire was the first in the education payment space to offer local payment options from China and India during the summer of 2012. Now, heading into the 2013 billing cycle, the company is uniquely positioned to offer the most ways to pay from these two countries, which boast two of the largest outgoing populations of international students.

Based on data from the Institute of International Education, Chinese and Indian students represent 38 percent of the total international student population studying in the United States, a 12.5 percent increase from 2010/11.

“Even though we have been processing payments from China and India for the last year, it is part of our mission to continually innovate and launch new payment methods that are the most convenient for students and their families,” said Iker Marcaide, CEO of Flywire. “Our goal is to offer students payment options with which they are already familiar, making the experience as easy as possible. For example, an Indian student can now choose to pay via ICICI bank, the second largest bank in India while a Chinese student can make an online payment directly from their bank account, send a traditional wire from any bank in China or select great options like China UnionPay or Alipay to pay their tuition.”

Flywire has processed thousands of payments from China and India and expects to see the volumes increase dramatically with the expanded capabilities. This growth directly benefits the over 325 educational institutions partnered with Flywire to date.

“Carnegie Mellon continues to be impressed by Flywire s dedication to creating familiar, convenient, and cost effective payment options for our international students. We are thrilled our students from India will have two local payment options and also that our students from China have four local payment options from which to choose for the upcoming payment cycle. These two countries represent 55 percent of our total international student population, so this is of huge value for the school and our students,” said Brian Hill, Director of Student Accounts at Carnegie Mellon University.

The company has been rapidly signing on schools in preparation for the upcoming billing cycle. The flexibility of the platform allows schools to start accepting payments in a matter of days without any IT integration required. To date, Flywire has processed payments from over 190 countries. With the expanded payment options from China and India, the two largest populations in the United States, schools and their students will benefit even more from the value Flywire offers.