PayFast launches Split Payments option, designed for platform commerce [Sponsored]

Online payment gateway, PayFast, has launched Split Payments, a SA-first that instantly splits a portion of an online payment with a third party.

The service is designed to facilitate fast, safe payments for platform-based businesses, including online marketplaces.

“PayFast has always seen itself as a business enabler. We realised that the growing platform economy in South Africa was being hampered by payment inefficiencies,” explains Jonathan Smit, Managing Director of PayFast.

“Split Payments is an elegant solution to unlock the potential of a platform-based business model.

PayFast’s Split Payments service helps facilitate fast, safe payments for online marketplaces

“Whether you run a marketplace that brings together multiple sellers or you’re a merchant looking for new sales channels, Split Payments solves your payment headaches with one, simple API integration.”

Consumers are used to engaging with large global transactional platforms such as AirBnB, Uber, and Amazon. The benefits and extended reach of these types of platforms are catching on locally and organisations like estate agency groups and even community marketplaces are setting up digital trading platforms to benefit from the economies of scale which come with them.

Split Payments complements this digital marketplace ecosystem. It’s a solution designed to cater for a variety of business models that require the instant allocation of an online payment to a third party.

Split Payments allows businesses to instantly split out commission, membership or listing fees when a payment is made via one of PayFast’s supported payment methods.

For each online payment received, the business can determine what the split is; either a fixed amount, a percentage, or a combination of both. Custom recurring payment integration such as tokenization or subscriptions payments can also be split automatically.

Signup is simple and more information about the custom integration is also available for the developer community.

“At PayFast we pride ourselves on staying ahead of the trend and delivering relevant solutions to the South African ecommerce sector.

“We are excited about the future possibilities of digital platform economies and our role in facilitating secure online payments for them,” Smit concludes.

This article was sponsored by PayFast.