Point of Sale Financing: A Secret Tool for Tapping into Untapped Market Size

Kent Yunk

March 20, 2019

Your objective, as a business, is to sell your products to as many customers as you can. However, some willing customers may be unable to purchase from you because they lack cash and access to traditional credit cards. As such, most of these businesses have very low sales turnover ratios.

The good news is that, with the advancement of technology, most businesses are reversing this trend. Apart from cash and credit cards, there is now a new payment option called point-of-sale financing.

What is Point of Sale Financing?

This is a new payment option that allows your customers to shop without cash or credit cards. Through this option, customers are offered unlimited access to credit at the point of sale (POS). This option is ideal for one-off and big purchases from customers who are new to credit.

Unlike normal credit, to get point of sale financing, you only need to provide your personal information: customer’s name, date of birth, phone number, and the last four digits of the Social Security number. The borrowing rates are relatively high --the option is recommended only as an emergency measure.

The point-of-sale financing’s loans duration varies from 14 days to 36 months.

How does Point of Sale Financing Work?

Like other shopping experiences, a customer will need to check into a store (online or physical one). If online, after adding an item into the shopping cart, when checking out, a customer will be prompted to choose a payment option. Point of Sale financing option, among other options, will appear next to the purchase price of the product. The customer will need to select the option that will instantly link him/her to the lender’s website where the customer will be required to provide his/her personal information. If in a physical store, at the checkout counter, the customer will need to complete a point of sale financing application form. If approved, the customer will be allowed to go home with purchase.

What are the possible Advantages of POS Financing to your Business?

If you implement a POS financing option in your business, you will achieve the following benefits:

Your sales will increase –point-of-sale financing increases the buying power of your customers
Point of sale financing is ideal for big, one-off purchases such as electronics and furniture. You will encourage your customers to buy items of higher cost
You will build and present a positive company image to your customers
You will increase cash inflows
It’s key in customer attraction and retention

The option will broaden your customer base. Customers new to credit will buy from your business. Instead of using the traditional data such as your credit score and history, point of sale financing option only use local algorithms such as review your checking account transactions to check creditworthiness.

How does Point of Sale Financing relate to your Industry’s market size?

A survey done by Forrester indicates that enterprises that implemented an online POS financing option got a 32% increment in their sales. However, even with this attractive prospect of implementing a point of sales financing, few companies have embraced the option. This is because it needs a lot of working capital to provide in-house financing services.

An alternative to an in-house financing program is to install a Call Contact Center Software that will enable you to alter your in-store POS terminals to include functionalities to connect to key integration points in your POS so you can deliver a quick and easy financing checkout process for all your customers. There are third-party POS financing providers willing to a partner with you.

However, while choosing a POS financing platform solution, consider the hosting and maintenance costs. It is cheaper to host your platform on reliable cloud services provider like 8x8 than implement your own platform. Cloud POS financing platforms will only need you to integrate your virtual contact center to reputable lenders.

Conclusion

Your sales and marketing teams need the best technology to be as productive as possible. With 8x8's Virtual Contact Center you get world-class technology and everything your domestic or international business needs all in one system. Call 1-866-943-9205 or fill out an online form to request a no-obligation quote from an 8x8 product specialist.