Paidy does not require pre-registration or a credit card to use; Paidy consumers purchase products online using a mobile phone number and email address (verification is established though a four-digit code sent via SMS) and settle all their purchases in a single monthly bill. Paidy also supports instalment and subscription payments. There are currently over 1,500,000 Paidy users.1
Visa is working to develop and support new payment methods, as the world moves beyond plastic and towards digital credentials. In 2017, the scale of the domestic ecommerce market in Japan expanded by 9.1% to 16.5 trillion yen.2 Japan is among the world’s fastest growing ecommerce markets3, but is also heavily reliant on cash. Visa and Paidy have a shared objective to offer consumers more convenient alternatives to current popular payment methods, like cash on delivery. The companies’ collaboration will also support Paidy’s expansion into new types of services for their customers.
“We have been following Paidy’s progress and the enhanced shopping experience they provide at the time of purchase,” said Chris Clark, Regional President, Asia Pacific, Visa. “In Japan there is enormous opportunity to bring consumers more options to pay, whether all at once or in instalments, especially when shopping across multiple channels. We look forward to this partnership to deliver these kind of new experiences.”
Russell Cummer, Founder and Executive Chairman of Paidy said, “We are extremely honoured that Paidy’s business concept was highly valued by the world's largest payment network, Visa. Through this tie-up, we expect to deliver Paidy’s frictionless and intuitive transactional credit to a much broader audience. Furthermore, by adding new payment functions and diverse financial services, together with Visa, we can promote our vision of removing barriers and create unique consumer experiences for as many people as possible.”
1 Paidy, August 2018
2 Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry, 2017
3 Export.gov, September 2017