The Arab world's leading online payment service provider Payfort has launched on Sunday an instalments service in Egypt, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, to allow e-commerce merchants to offer pay-via-instalment options to customers. Managing Director of Payfort Omar Soudodi explained, in a statement, that many consumers prefer purchasing-via-instalments; however, the methods were proven to be "cumbersome" for consumers. "This could be a game-changer for the Middle East and North Africa's e-commerce market, empowering online consumers with greater purchasing power and so opening up a whole new segment of consumers for the ecommerce industry," Soudodi said. Under the new service, customers can use their credit cards to purchase products and services through e-commerce websites, fulfilling their payments in monthly instalments to their choice of retail bank. According to Payfort, the service will be available in Egypt through Mashreq Bank, in the UAE through Emirates NBD, Mashreq Bank, and Abu Dhabi Commercial Bank (ADCB), and in Saudi Arabia through the Saudi British Bank (SABB), National Commercial Bank (NCB) and Saudi Hollandi Bank. The region's online pay-via-instalments segment is currently growing significantly, as Souq.com, the largest e-commerce platform in the MENA region, has made the instalments payment option available to customers through its operations in the UAE and Saudi Arabia, according to the statement. Payfort is the payment platform for e-commerce websites such as Souq.com, Dubizzle.com, Landmark, Sukar, AirCairo, Flynas, Air Arabia, Carrefour, and Tecom. Only 6-8 million individuals are customers in the Egyptian banking sector, according to NBE Chairman Hisham Okasha. There are 12m credit cards in Egypt, but approximately 33 million mobile phone customers do not use any method of electronic payment. This creates an opportunity for bankers to convince people to use mobile phones in the payment process.
