Things are humming at FlexiGroup

John Kavanagh
Finance company FlexiGroup has launched its new "buy now pay later" brand humm, announcing a number of new retail and healthcare partners and promoting what it sees as a significant advantage over its rivals.

humm is a consolidation and refresh of two existing products, Certegy EziPay and OxiPay, which have been in the market for many years.

FlexiGroup chief executive Rebecca James told investors at the company's half-year results briefing that a strategic review of the business found that its product set was complex and out of date, its operations hampered by duplication and lack of scalability and its retail partnerships too heavily focused on bricks and mortar.

The consolidation of Certegy and OxiPay is part of a bigger simplification program. The company plans to cut the number of consumer facing brands from 12 to four.

FlexiGroup hopes that a big selling point will be that consumers can use humm to make purchases up to A$30,000 without any interest cost. For purchases above $2000 humm will charge a fee of $8 a month.

Afterpay only handles purchases up to $2000 and Zip charges interest and a monthly fee.

A FlexiGroup spokesperson said the company has spent the past couple of months moving existing retail partners onto the new platform. Yesterday it announced a number of new partners, including Myer, IKEA, JB HiFi New Zealand, Solomon's Carpets and Strandbags.

FlexiGroup is also positioning humm in the healthcare market and has signed agreements with National Hearing, National Dental Plan and City Fertility.

The company claims that it has 17 per cent share of the buy no pay later transaction volume in Australia and 40 per cent of receivables, with 13,000 seller locations and e-commerce sites.

humm's predecessors, Certegy and OxiPay, are profitable businesses, reporting cash profit of $17 million for the December half.