Automated Direct Debit: Fixing Loan Repayment in Fintech

Loan defaults don’t usually start with bad people. They start with bad repayment systems.

Across Africa, fintech has made loan disbursement almost frictionless. A customer taps a few buttons, funds land instantly, and everyone feels like progress is happening. Then repayment day comes—bank transfers fail, mobile money wallets are empty, reminders get ignored, and collections teams spend their week chasing promises. That gap between easy disbursement and messy repayment is where many digital lenders quietly bleed.

Nigeria’s Zeeh Africa relaunching Direct Debit is a timely case study for our series, “AI ne Fintech: Sɛnea Akɔntabuo ne Mobile Money Rehyɛ Ghana den.” The story isn’t really about one startup. It’s about a hard truth Ghana’s mobile money and digital credit players need to face: financial inclusion collapses when repayment is unreliable, opaque, or abusive. Automation—done with consent and good data—fixes more than cashflow. It fixes trust.

Why digital lenders struggle with repayment (not disbursement)

The core problem is simple: collections is operations-heavy, emotionally charged, and easy to get wrong. Disbursement is a single event; repayment is a relationship that repeats every week or month.

In Nigeria, the Central Bank’s Q2 2025 Credit Conditions Survey reported weakening loan performance and more borrowers falling behind on unsecured loans, with lenders reporting higher defaults (net balance of -1.5). That’s happening while digital lenders have multiplied fast, making uncollateralised credit more accessible—and, in many cases, easier to default on.

Ghana has its own version of this tension. Mobile money has expanded access, but digital credit still depends on disciplined repayment. If repayment feels confusing, punitive, or inconsistent, borrowers disengage. If lenders respond with harassment, the whole ecosystem loses credibility.

The hidden cost: “good borrowers subsidise bad borrowers”

Zeeh’s CEO put it bluntly: disbursement became efficient, collection did not. When repayment is inconsistent, lenders raise interest rates, tighten eligibility, or reduce loan limits. The people who pay on time end up funding the risk created by weak systems.

Here’s the chain reaction most teams underestimate:

• Unreliable repayment → higher defaults
• Higher defaults → higher pricing + stricter underwriting
• Stricter underwriting → fewer eligible customers
• Fewer customers → slower growth and more pressure to “lend riskier”

If your goal is inclusion, repayment reliability is not optional.

Direct Debit, explained like a product manager

Direct Debit is a consent-based mechanism that allows a business to automatically debit a customer’s account on agreed dates.

The key phrase is agreed dates. It’s not “grab money whenever you want.” Done properly, Direct Debit is structured around a mandate: the customer authorises how much can be collected, how often, and for how long.

Zeeh’s relaunch matters because it aims to make Direct Debit practical for digital lenders at scale, not just big subscription companies.

What Zeeh relaunched—and why it’s relevant

Zeeh introduced Direct Debit in 2024, paused it later that year, then rebuilt and relaunched after testing a beta (starting February) with around 20 businesses. The company now says it powers 22 businesses with the relaunched product, while serving 150 enterprises across its API products. They’ve processed 5 million API calls year-to-date, which signals real usage rather than “pilot theatre.”

Two product choices stand out:

1. Installments and structured repayment: Not everyone can pay in one shot. Recurring collections reduce missed payments caused by timing.
2. Signed mandates with real-time status updates: The lender knows whether the debit succeeded, failed, or is pending—without endless manual follow-up.

This is the operational side of inclusion. Not flashy. Very profitable.

Consent, transparency, and regulation: the direction Africa is moving

Automated collections can either build trust—or destroy it. The difference is governance.

Nigeria has already felt the backlash against aggressive digital lending. That’s why the FCCPC’s July 2025 digital lending regulations emphasise transparent, consented repayment methods and restrict privacy-violating collection practices.

This is where Direct Debit, done right, becomes more than a payment feature:

• It creates an auditable trail of consent (mandate logs)
• It reduces the temptation for harassment-based collections
• It standardises repayment timing, amounts, and expectations

Ghana is on a similar path culturally, even when the regulatory details differ. Borrowers are increasingly sensitive to how lenders use their data and how they treat customers when money is tight.

A lender that automates repayment with consent will outlast a lender that “wins” by intimidation.

That’s not moralising. It’s survival.

Where AI fits: from “debit the account” to “prevent the default”

Direct Debit helps you collect. AI helps you collect without creating new problems.

Most lenders only think about AI for underwriting—who gets the loan. The more interesting application in 2026 is repayment intelligence: predicting repayment risk early, personalising schedules, and choosing the least-friction collection route.

Practical AI use cases for automated repayment systems

Here are AI patterns I’ve seen work (and where Ghana’s fintech and mobile money ecosystem can benefit quickly):

1. Cashflow-aware scheduling

   • If a borrower’s inflows typically hit on Fridays, schedule repayment Fridays.
   • If inflows are irregular, use smaller, more frequent installments.

2. Early-warning signals before a missed payment

   • Declining balance trends
   • Reduced inflow frequency
   • Increased failed payment attempts

3. Dynamic collection channel selection

   • Attempt direct debit first (bank)
   • Fall back to mobile money prompt
   • Offer a self-serve reschedule option before default

4. Fairness checks and explainability

   • Flag when a model is over-penalising informal workers
   • Provide customer-facing reasons for repayment plan changes

AI doesn’t replace mandates and consent. It makes them smarter.

Lessons from Nigeria for Ghana’s mobile money-driven credit market

Ghana doesn’t need to copy Nigeria’s exact payment rails to learn from this story. The lesson is strategic: repayment infrastructure is as important as credit scoring.

1) Build repayment as a “journey,” not a single API call

Zeeh is positioning Direct Debit as part of a full credit stack: identity verification, affordability checks, bank statement analysis, and automated recovery tools.

That integrated approach matters because collections failures often start earlier:

• Weak KYC → wrong account details → failed debits
• Poor affordability checks → repayment plan doesn’t match reality
• No visibility into bank activity → lenders “guess” and over-collect

For Ghanaian lenders and fintech product teams: if repayment is bolted on at the end, it will always underperform.

2) Use mobile money as a strength, but don’t ignore bank rails

Mobile money is Ghana’s advantage. But many borrowers still receive salaries through banks, keep savings in bank accounts, or move funds between both.

A strong repayment strategy uses multi-rail collections:

• Bank Direct Debit where available
• Mobile money recurring payments or prompts
• Employer-linked repayments for salary-backed products

The goal is simple: reduce “I wanted to pay but couldn’t” moments.

3) Collections ethics is now a growth strategy

The fastest way to lose the market is to normalise abusive collections. The fastest way to win the market is to make repayment predictable and respectful.

Borrowers remember how you treat them when they’re late. And they tell others.

Implementation checklist: what to do if you’re building this in Ghana

If you’re a lender, BNPL operator, or subscription business thinking about automated repayment, here’s a practical build/buy checklist.

Must-haves (non-negotiable)

• Explicit mandate capture (who authorised, what amount, what schedule)
• Clear customer messaging before each debit attempt
• Real-time status visibility (success/failure/pending)
• Retry logic with limits (avoid “draining” accounts through repeated attempts)
• Dispute and reversal process that’s easy to access

Nice-to-haves that reduce defaults fast

• Installment plan builder (customer chooses dates/amounts within constraints)
• Smart rescheduling (one-click grace period options)
• Multi-rail fallbacks (bank → mobile money)
• AI-based risk scoring for repayment, not just underwriting

Metrics to track weekly (not monthly)

• On-time repayment rate
• Payment success rate per rail (bank vs mobile money)
• Mandate conversion rate (approved mandates / eligible customers)
• Average days past due (DPD)
• Collections cost per account

If you can’t measure it weekly, you’re flying blind.

Direct Debit competition is real—so differentiation must be real too

Zeeh is entering a market where major fintech players already offer Direct Debit. That’s not a small problem. Payments infrastructure tends to concentrate because reliability and trust compound.

So what actually differentiates a Direct Debit provider?

• Uptime and failure recovery (not marketing)
• Mandate UX (how quickly customers consent and understand)
• Data advantage (open banking insights + credit context)
• Operational tools (dashboards, retries, reconciliation)

If your Direct Debit product is “just another debit button,” it won’t last.

Where this leaves Ghana’s fintech ecosystem in 2026

Automated repayment systems are becoming the baseline for responsible digital credit across Africa. The Nigeria case shows the market pressure from rising defaults, the regulatory pressure for consent and transparency, and the operational pressure to reduce collections cost.

For Ghana, the opportunity is to combine three strengths:

• Mobile money scale
• Better repayment automation (mandates, schedules, multi-rail)
• AI-driven repayment intelligence (early warning + personalised plans)

That’s exactly the direction this series is tracking: AI ne Fintech that makes akɔntabuo and mobile money more trustworthy, more efficient, and more human in how it handles risk.

If you’re building digital lending, BNPL, or subscription payments in Ghana, don’t treat repayment as an afterthought. Treat it as product.

So here’s the question worth sitting with: If your collections team disappeared for a week, would your repayment system still work—and would customers still feel respected?