Marqeta, Figure Team on BNPL POS Solution

Card-issuing platform Marqeta is providing the FinTech Figure with technology that will let users of the Figure Pay product decide at cash registers whether to spend their own money or use buy now, pay later (BNPL) financing.

Figure Pay is available in 26 U.S. states and eventually will be available nationwide, Oakland-based Marqeta stated in a press release. The service, which uses the Provenance Blockchain payments infrastructure, appears to be aimed at individuals without low credit capacity, who are often called “thin-file” customers. Figure maintains that the service will be faster and cheaper for merchants than alternative payments systems.

Figure Pay’s features, according to Marqeta, include a no-fee deposit account, “seamless money transfer to friends and family,” an awards program and free use of 55,000 ATMs. Notably, the product also includes a built-in BNPL option that customers can select as they’re making purchases.

“Figure’s ethos as a company, reimagining the core infrastructure of financial services and layering on products that better match new consumer demands and expectations, is something that resonates with us strongly at Marqeta, and we’re excited that they’ve chosen our modern card issuing platform to power Figure Pay,” Darren Mowry, chief revenue officer at Marqeta, said in a prepared statement. “Figure Pay’s combination of digital money management with buy now, pay later functionality is a forward-thinking application of this technology.”

Under the companies’ arrangement, Figure will manage transaction authorizations, a flexibility that will let Figure Pay users decide at the point of sale whether to make their purchases as traditional debit card transactions or via the POS option.

Marqeta stated in the announcement that there has been “a surge in buy now, pay later use through its platform, with net revenues rising 350% year over year in Q2 2021.”

“We had a very specific vision for Figure Pay, building a new payments tool where people could have end-to-end management of their money and the ability to have complete flexibility at the point of sale about how to finance a purchase,” Tony Morosini, head of banking and payments at Figure, stated in the announcement. “Marqeta’s modern technology was integral to making this happen and they were true partners, working with us every step of the way to help us build a product that matched our vision.”