Split Payment Options Have The Millennials And Gen Zs Vote, Here’s Why

Reading Time: 4 minutes

Buy Now Pay Later. No questions asked. 

Powered by its convenience and customer-centricity, BNPL is pushing the boundaries of online shopping, paving the way for a hassle-free consumer journey, from browsing a product to its ultimate check out. 

BNPL seems to have perfectly resonated with millennials and Gen Z. This is because Pay Later essentially caters to all the needs, demands, and perspectives that millennials and Gen Zs associate with finance and technology.

 

Gen Zs and millennials are extremely tech-savvy and coupled with a high percentage of visual literacy they respond to sophisticated digital innovations extremely well. Within the financial realm, they are quite aware of the complexities of various economic processes, and usually want a transparent and bodacious relationship with money. 

The advantage of BNPL over most other payment systems lies in its simplicity, efficiency, transparency, and improved user experience. It allows consumers to make purchases with zero-interest loans which one can pay at their convenience, and additionally, makes way for micro-credit facilities to enhance product affordability. All these factors combined allow BNPL to simply click with the millennials and Gen Zs.

In the following paragraphs, we will observe how all these aspects perfectly fit the jigsaw of Gen Z’s and Millennials’ modern outlook on finance and its handling.

 

BNPL steals the show with its payment simplicity

As millennials and Gen Z have come to dominate the modern technology-driven consumer space, their choices have become the defining trends of the time.

They are on a constant lookout for innovative, user-friendly personal finance options that are instantaneous and easily understandable. In other words, extremely convenient, transparent, and accessible. 

 

BNPL ticks all these checkboxes with pride. During the checkout process, the option of BNPL confirms the buy with just a few taps before proceeding to checkout. 

Gen Zs prefer a hassle-free credit option, one that can be availed digitally in a time frame of seconds and is not bound by a rigid credit score. 

BNPL perfectly falls within Gen Z’s definition of simplicity, being driven by superfast purchases and an instant short-term credit facility. Naturally, over 48% of buyers want to stick to this payment method due to its scheduled billing cycles and simple navigation. 

 

Gen Z and Millennials stay away from high-EMI loans  

The world is massively shifting towards areas of self-service, 24/7 accessibility via apps, digital banking, and automation of various processes. Gen Zs and millennials are the vanguards of this worldwide phenomenon. In this massive shift of various traditional procedures, loan taking isn’t left behind.

Traditional loan facilities used to be a long, tenuous process of showcasing a decent credit score and convincing the bank manager of a plausible reason behind the loan. This entire process of pre-approval for loans significantly changed with the arrival of credit cards. Although the approval process became a lot simpler, the condition of a loan being granted based on one’s credit score remained constant. 

 

Also, an important reason behind Gen Z’s affinity towards small, manageable debts is because they have witnessed millennials with very high student loans and debts. This has widely affected their financial habits. They are wary of high-EMI loans of extensive amounts as they have also grown up with a better foundation of financial planning than their predecessors. Most of them have a sound understanding of credit scores and their sophistication. 

So, in an effort to avoid defaulting loans and have strong control over their finances, Gen Zs have switched to BNPL. Moreover, with the vast array of options and innumerable offerings at their disposal, millennials and their successors are at that perfect intersection point where they will demand the best of all services.

 

BNPL comes with no debt traps and makes Gen Z more self-sufficient 

Credit cards when they were first introduced, solved a major problem in the absence of liquid cash. But the affinity towards it has witnessed a decline given the cost of having one. Additionally, hidden charges such as withdrawal transaction fees, late fees, chances of rash transactions due to lucrative cash-back rewards often culminate into a recurring debt. 

And contrary to what boomers think, millennials and Gen Zs are anything but frivolous buyers. They have grown up within a space of self-service with technology being their backbone. They realize how uncontrolled expenditure can affect their independence and self-sufficient lives.

 

Therefore, when BNPL came to the fintech space, it gained wide popularity among these segments of the population because apart from it being safer and transparent, it also appealed to the self-sufficiency factor of the payment method.  

So, if we combine all these factors together, we see that BNPL unbound the youth from debt traps, gives them perfect autonomy over their finances, by taking care of their expenditure via temporary micro-credit.

 

Sound financial health due to increased control over expenditure

Control over one’s expenditure used to be a huge deal for credit cards, but with BNPL it has become a cakewalk. In one of our previous blogs, we had discussed things to be mindful of while using credit cards. But BNPL does not demand such careful attention at every financial step we take. 

Today, when a millennial comes across an expensive high-demand product, he has complete control over his buying choices and expenditure. Millennials and Gen Zs who do not have an amicable history with the concept of ‘credit score’, are sure to look for alternate avenues that offer them this flexibility. 

 

 

Final Words

It is noteworthy to observe that Gen Z has grown up witnessing the Great Recession of our times, the financial meltdown of 2008. It was the inception of enabling technology to occupy a central position in our lives, evident with the smartphone boom. And Gen Z being the youth of these challenging times, they have learned to surf the waves of financial insecurity with technology as its primary arsenal. 

They are more driven by ideals of speed, transparency, ease of use, and an experience that puts them and their needs at the centre. As traditional credit facilities lack these options, split-payment modes will garner exponential support and acceptance in the coming years.