Trustly and Fitness Software Firm BRP Team on Open Banking

Open banking payments provider Trustly has launched a partnership with fitness/wellness software-maker BRP Systems.

The collaboration, announced Tuesday (Dec. 17), integrates Trusty’s payment solution with BRP’s platform, letting businesses optimize recurring payments.

Based in Sweden, BRP serves more than 2,500 fitness and wellness facilities and 3.5 million end users, the companies noted in a news release. The partnership builds on Trusty’s presence in the fitness and wellness market, having acquired SlimPay earlier this year, according to the release. That deal brought with it relationships with several prominent fitness brands such as Fitness Park.

“Partnering with Trustly is an exciting step forward for BRP Systems,” said Marius Andersson, BRP’s chief product officer. “By integrating their payment solutions, we’re enhancing our ability to support customers in improving operational efficiency, driving business growth, and delivering superior member experiences. This partnership reinforces our position as the leading software provider for the fitness and wellness market and highlights our commitment to innovation.”

PYMNTS spoke last month with Trustly CEO Alexandre Gonthier about the confusion around terms such as open banking payments, pay by bank or account-to-account (A2A) payments.

A2A, he said, is the “broadest umbrella term” for bank payments because the A2A designation covers direct debit (or pull) payments and real-time credit transfer (or push) payments, along with peer-to-peer transactions.

Depending on the type of payment, the funds move across different networks or schemes, from ACH to SEPA to the FedNow® Service. Open banking payments are a combination of open banking technology and A2A payment functionality.

“It can be confusing because the term ‘pay by bank’ could technically mean any of the aforementioned payment schemes,” he said. “But most people today say, ‘pay by bank’ and mean ‘open banking payments.’”

There is potential for further adoption, PYMNTS noted, as just around a tenth of consumers have used pay by bank, while 44% of non-users weren’t aware of the payment option.

Ross McFerrin, vice president of growth at Trustly, told PYMNTS that interest in pay by bank climbs to 81% of consumers once they’re told about incentives like cashback and discounts.

“Merchants have an opportunity to control their own destiny on the payment page by incentivizing pay by bank for consumers,” McFerrin said. “At the same time, pay-by-bank providers will have an opportunity to lean into open banking technology to innovate payment options through products that meet the needs of consumers.”