CredPal secures $15m debt equity funding, to expand into Ghana, Kenya

Digital lending startup, CredPal has announced a $15 million debt financing, provided by Greenhouse Capital, a finance-focused venture capital firm; a few unnamed financial institutions and new investors including LongCommerce, Uncovered Fund, First Circle Capital, and Adii Pienaar, co-founder and former CEO of WooCommerce.

CredPal provides Buy Now, Pay Later (BNPL) online payment options. With an instalment and flexible payment approach, customers get easy access to small figures from as low as 2,000 Naira up to 5 million Naira.

The company has raised $15 million in equity and debt to expand its consumer credit offerings across Africa. It has partnerships with other major platforms and is looking to add telecom operator, Airtel, to its list. The new investment is a combination of equity and debt round to support its expansion into other African markets, mainly Kenya, Egypt, Ghana and Cameroon.

This latest funding follows a $1.5 million raise in 2020.

CredPal was founded in 2017 (but became fully operational in 2018). It has offered customers the availability of quick accessible short term loans while partnering with merchants across different sectors to offer, buy, eat, lounge, travel and pay later to working-class Nigerians.

The company offers customers options to shop, enjoy discount and cashback offers from over 12,000 merchants and pay later. The startup hopes to fulfil its mission of providing easy access to consumer credit across all payment channels and to become the largest consumer credit brand in Africa.

Fehintolu Olaogun, CEO, CredPal, while explaining CredPal’s ranking in the growing BNPL Fintech competition, spotted its uniqueness as an omnichannel approach to BNPL.

 “We’ve built out a merchant suite to cater to those who have like full-fledged e-commerce websites to those with brick and mortar store and social commerce merchants. We are merchants agnostic and also our tech allows consumers to be able to interface with CredPal across a wide range of channel

Fehintolu Olaogun

Why is BPNL important?

With BNPL creating a foothold in the Nigerian market, Fintech BNPL platforms are slowly taking over the traditional Nigeria loan scheme, as BNPL can be seen as a major win, especially with our growing population, vis-a-vis an inflated economy, purchasing power that’s almost non-existent, not forgetting that the minimum wage is still at 33,000 Naira ($79.37).

This disproportion has set BNPL as a possible solution for the average Nigerian consumer to pay for goods and services.

Though this type of payment plan has been available for years, it exploded in popularity during the pandemic as more people shifted to online shopping, and others could no longer afford to buy what they needed.

How BPNL systems work

BNPL does not impose interest on overdue payments. They ascertain customers’ credit ratings by matching their monthly income to monthly spending, providing a clear and concise approach to repayment possibilities.

During check out, you’ll see an option to break up your total purchase and pay a smaller amount now, instead of the full balance.

For example, if your total purchase is 70,000 naira, you will pay 10,000 Naira at checkout, they may have three remaining payments of 20,000 Naira, each due 30 days apart. As long as you make all payments on time, you will have paid off your purchase in three months.

However, if you’re struggling to pay your bills or start an emergency fund, steer clear of buy now, pay later. Because of its ease and convenience, it’s possible to overspend with BNPL. You may incur high late fees or be sent to collections, which will hurt your credit score.

The CredPal Solution

This new funding takes CredPal one step closer to creating a safer, innovative and cheaper way of borrowing money without worrying about overdue interest rates or overexaggerated repayment prices.

A lot of people like to buy things and most importantly, everyone has needs so having access to a service like this helps consumers meet their needs conveniently as they can get or do what they want without having to pay for it all at once.

Olorunfemi Jegede, COO, Co-Founder of CredPal

In line with this idea, CredPal is looking to partner with telecom operator, Airtel Nigeria, in its bid to expand, both product-wise and geographically, to further allow low to middle-income earners to purchase smartphones in instalments.