A PromptPay QR code with your face on it
Every QR code looks like every other QR code. That is a problem in a group chat, where three people have posted theirs, and a problem in a gallery, where ten screenshots are indistinguishable. Putting a photo or a logo in the middle of the code fixes both, and the code still scans in every Thai banking app.
Why identical codes cost money
A QR code tells a human nothing. In a chat where several people have shared one, the only way to tell them apart is the message above it, and messages scroll. Pay the wrong code and the money is gone to a real person who was owed nothing, and getting it back is a favour, not a right.
The same is true of your own gallery. Codes collect: your own, your landlord's, the shop you buy water from, the friend you still owe for a taxi. Without a face on them, finding the right one means scanning them one at a time.
How a picture fits inside a code
QR codes carry error correction, which means a portion of the pattern can be missing or covered and the code still reads. That is how the logos in the middle of codes everywhere work, and a payment code is no different.
The limit is how much is covered. A small, centred picture is safe; a big one eats into the data and the code stops scanning. The practical answer is to place and size it deliberately, then test by scanning with another phone, which takes five seconds and is worth doing once.
For a person
A face on your code means a friend can glance at the chat and know it is yours. It means your own album is browsable. And it means the code can go on a profile or a page without a caption explaining whose it is.
This is the whole reason SlipDee exists in the shape it does: the code with your photo, kept somewhere findable, with a page of your own at the end of it.
For a shop
A printed code on a counter is the one thing a customer has to trust in a cash-free shop, and swapped stickers are a known scam in several countries. A logo in the middle, matching the sign above the till, is a check the customer can make without being told to.
It also looks like the shop rather than like a photocopy, which is a small thing that quietly matters when somebody is deciding whether to pay.
Checklist
- Use a picture that reads at the size of a thumbnail: a face, a logo, not a landscape.
- Keep the picture centred and small enough that the pattern around it stays intact.
- Scan the finished code with another phone before using it anywhere.
- Check that the name shown on the scan is the right account.
- Replace the code if the registered identifier changes.
- For a shop, match the picture to the sign customers can see.
Make your own PromptPay QR
Your code with your photo on it, so friends can see who they are paying. Free, in the browser, and it works with every Thai bank.
Open SlipDeeFrequently asked questions
Will a bank app refuse a code with a picture on it?
- No. The app reads the payload, which is unchanged. What matters is that enough of the pattern is readable, which is a question of how much the picture covers, not of whether there is one.
Can I use my shop logo instead of a face?
- Yes, and for a business it is the better choice: the customer compares it with the sign on the wall.
Does the picture leave my phone?
- That depends on the tool. In SlipDee a code is built with the picture you choose and kept with your codes; what is published is the code image itself, which is the thing meant to be seen.
Is this an official feature of PromptPay?
- The branded centre is not part of the standard, it is a property of QR codes in general. The payment payload underneath is an ordinary PromptPay code.
What if the printed code gets dirty or scratched?
- Error correction covers small damage, which is the same reason a picture works. Heavy damage stops it, so a printed code on a counter is worth replacing when it starts looking tired.
