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UseQR

Glossary

EMVCo QR code

EMVCo QR is the international standard for payment QR codes, defining a tag-length-value payload used by PIX in Brazil, PromptPay in Thailand, QRIS in Indonesia and many others. It has merchant-presented and consumer-presented modes.

The structure

Every field is ID (2 digits) + length (2 digits) + value, concatenated, with a CRC16/CCITT-FALSE checksum in field 63. Nested templates carry scheme-specific data.

Common fields: 00 payload format, 52 merchant category code, 53 currency (ISO 4217), 58 country, 59 merchant name, 60 merchant city, 62 additional data, 63 CRC.

Merchant-presented versus consumer-presented

  • MPM — the merchant displays a code, the customer scans it. The counter standee.
  • CPM — the customer's app displays a rotating code, the merchant scans it. Used at supermarket tills; the code is short-lived by design.

National profiles built on it

Country Scheme
Brazil PIX
Thailand PromptPay
Indonesia QRIS
Malaysia DuitNow
Singapore PayNow / SGQR
India BharatQR (UPI itself uses its own deep-link format)

Each profile fixes the nested template ids and adds constraints, which is why a PIX code and a PromptPay code look structurally similar but are not interchangeable.

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