North China's Shanxi province has finished upgrading and facilitating the new permanent residence cards. All bank branches in the province now support foreign nationals in Shanxi using permanent residence cards and passports to open bank accounts.

By the end of November, Shanxi had 61,400 businesses that accepted foreign cards, with key designated businesses achieving a 100 percent acceptance rate. The Taiyuan Metro Line 2 has also fully implemented foreign card acceptance across its 23 stations.

The province has installed 6,989 ATMs that support foreign card cash withdrawals, with 798 bank branches offering foreign currency exchange services, one licensed institution for individual currency exchange, and 75 foreign currency exchange agencies.

Shanxi has facilitated the construction of eight payment service demonstration zones, including Taiyuan Wusu International Airport, Taiyuannan Railway Station, Jinci Temple, Yungang Grottoes, and Wutai Mountain. These zones cover world cultural heritage sites, national-level tourist leisure streets, and major transportation hubs, providing "one-stop" payment services for foreign nationals in Shanxi.

On Dec 17, the National Immigration Administration announced that Taiyuan Wusu International Airport in Shanxi had become one of the ports to implement the visa-free transit policy.