Sezzle Offers Rewards for On-Time BNPL Payments

Payments platform Sezzle wants to reward users to stay on top of their bills.

To that end, the company on Wednesday (May 1) announced the launch of Payment Streaks, a feature designed to let users of the company’s buy now, pay later (BNPL) offering rise through loyalty tiers by making consistent, on-time payments.

“The Payment Streaks program empowers Sezzle users by introducing a gamification approach to responsible payment behaviors,” the company said in a news release.

“Each successful payment made on or before its scheduled due date contributes to the user’s payment streak. As users accumulate streaks of on-time payments within a rolling 90-day window, they qualify for advancement to higher loyalty tiers.”

The program works like this: Each payment made on or before its due date counts as a “streak.” Users can reach the next loyalty tier after meeting the required streak count within a rolling 90-day window. And users who fail to make a payment can resolve that issue within the same day to maintain their existing loyalty tier.

According to the release, the program offers a variety of benefits to users, such as entries in monthly giveaways and bonuses for referring friends to Sezzle.

PYMNTS spoke last summer with Sezzle CEO Charlie Youakim, who noted that for many consumers, “BNPL is a budgeting tool.”

Joint research by his company and PYMNTS Intelligence bear that out, showing that most people don’t see BNPL as a credit product, but as a way to manage cash flow. It’s a popular one at that, with 40% of BNPL users saying they would not make a purchase without that option on hand, or would opt to make a less-expensive purchase.

“For these customers, it becomes essential that some sort of financing is available, but [with BNPL], they’re diverting a flow of funds away from high-cost financing products to a very low-cost financing product,” Sezzle said. “It’s a big win for consumers.”

More recent research by PYMNTS Intelligence and Splitit found that BNPL is popular among consumers, especially older ones: 81% of baby boomers and seniors said they are highly satisfied with BNPL, while 86% of Generation X shoppers and 82% of bridge millennials shared the same enthusiasm for they payment method.

For younger consumers, it’s a different story. Sixty-eight percent of Generation Z shoppers say they are highly satisfied with BNPL.

“But it’s not just BNPL,” PYMNTS wrote last week. “Gen Z consumers are also less likely to be thrilled with merchant-card installment plans (62%) and even less so about credit card plans in general (57%).”

This could be due to a general uneasiness about taking debt, as Gen Z is also the lowest-earning cohort of any age group surveyed.