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The buy now, pay later payment option continues to barrel ahead as Covid-weary consumers seek new sources of credit at the point of sale. In the latest news, Splitit Payments Ltd., said it is testing the integration of a Visa Inc. application programming interface for installment payments and Sezzle Inc. announced it has doubled its employee base since the beginning of the year.
New York City-based Splitit said the Visa API test will enable issuers that have enrolled in the Visa Installment Program to provide installment payments to their Visa cardholders. Splitit will process eligible transactions through the API and issuers will fund merchants via Splitit. The test launches this quarter with an eye to expansion in 2021.
Visa launched the program in 2019 just as installment-payments providers began to gain share. Sometimes called POS lending, the market has grown since 2015 when it had 5% of the total unsecured lending market, according to a research note from Keefe, Bruyette & Woods, an investment firm that is part of St. Louis-based Stifel. That share grew to 8% in 2018 and is expected to increase to 11% in 2021.
In related news, buy now, pay later vendor Sezzle Inc. said it has grown its head count by 20% so far in the fourth quarter, doubling its employee base since the start of the year. Minneapolis-based Sezzle is hiring especially for its sales and marketing teams.
Sezzle in September announced a virtual card that would make its BNPL service an option for consumers to use in stores. The card is loaded into an Apple Pay or Google Pay wallet.
