Interface News Reporter | 林倩冰
On September 15, “Platform monthly payment will be withdrawn from payment options” became a hot search on Weibo.
According to a report by Sino-Singapore Jingwei on the evening of September 15, in response to this news, customer service staff of Alipay, Meituan, Douyin, JD.com and many other platforms responded that they have not received relevant notifications and monthly payment products can still be used normally.
In fact, behind the hot search is the upcoming “Measures for the Administration of Online Marketing of Financial Products” (hereinafter referred to as the “Measures”).
The “Measures” stipulate that non-bank payment institutions are not allowed to include loans, asset management products and other financial products as payment tool options, and are not allowed to provide marketing services for loans, asset management products and other financial products;When producing online marketing content that involves installment payments, you must not induce consumption by one-sided promotion of first-payment discounts, or use inductive terms such as “low risk,” “low threshold,” “second payment,” “high yield,” “low interest rate,” or “no cost.”The “Measures” will be implemented from September 30.
“One of the core points of the new regulations is to draw a clear line between payment instruments and credit and financial products to better protect consumers’ rights to know and choose.” Dong Ximiao, chief economist of China Merchants Union and executive director of Shanghai Finance and Development Laboratory, told Jiemian News.
Previously, many consumers encountered “loan product” problems when making payments, which once caused related products to be criticized.
In June this year, a consumer reported to Jiemian News,I was “activated” for a monthly payment service on a certain platform without my knowledge. From February to April this year, I spent nearly 20 yuan through monthly payment. She doesn’t know when she started the service, and she never received a repayment notice. After discovering the deductions caused by the monthly payment, the consumer repaid the payment and turned off the monthly payment function.
At that time, the consumer speculated that he might have been attracted by the offers displayed when using platform-related software and checked the relevant options, resulting in the monthly payment function being activated.
From the evening of September 15th to 16th, Jiemian News found thatMany Internet platforms have differentiated financial services.
比如，The checkout page of Xiaoxiang Supermarket shows that Meituan Monthly Payment is a financial service and has been separated from WeChat payment, Alipay payment and other payment methods;
Vipshop will classify “credit card installment payment” in the “credit” column to distinguish it from payment methods such as WeChat payment and digital renminbi.
While some platforms differentiate between credit services, they also indicate the source of funds or service provider at the credit service location. for example,滴滴The cashier interface separates credit purchases, marking it as a credit funding channel, and indicating that the service is a consumer credit service provided by Chongqing West Bank Small Loans.
Jiemian News noticed that some of the above platforms still use certain marketing language for credit products. For example, there is a line of small red text at the bottom of the order submission page of Xiaoxiang Supermarket, indicating that you will receive a certain amount of discounts by activating and using Meituan Monthly Payment. If you click on the small red text and then click “Pay Now”, the system will default to Meituan Monthly Payment in the financial services column for payment;滴滴Then mark it below the credit purchase, “Spend this month and pay back 0 rate next month.”
However, if you want to actually open relevant credit services, you still need to read and agree to the relevant agreements, real-name authentication and other processes. Jiemian News’ actual measurement found that before the platform credit service was officially launched, Xiaoxiang Supermarket,滴滴Consumers are required to read and agree to the relevant agreements, and then Xiaoxiang Supermarket requires consumers to upload their ID cards for real-name authentication.滴滴Consumers are required to perform face verification to verify their identity.
In this regard, Wang Pengbo, chief analyst of Broadcom Consulting, analyzed the interface and believed that from the overall compliance framework, the relevant page interactions should comply with relevant regulatory requirements. Whether the relevant marketing statements meet the requirements depends on whether the promised benefits are met after subsequent activation.
Dong Ximiao believes that the relevant pages basically meet the requirements. However, there is still room for improvement in how to differentiate more clearly, such as changing “financial services” to “lending services”.
During the actual test, Jiemian News found that some platforms still did not separate credit products on the cashier interface.
For example, according to actual measurements by Jiemian News on the evening of September 15th and 16th, in the Douyin cashier interface, payment methods such as Alipay, Douyin Pay, and Douyin Monthly Payment are not separated. The “Douyin Monthly Payment User Service Agreement” shows that Douyin Monthly Payment is Shenzhen Bread Star Technology Co., Ltd. and Shenzhen Bread Haohai Technology Co., Ltd. as operators, providing Internet information and technical support capabilities, and cooperating with legally qualified lending institutions to provide users with online consumer financial services.
The Taobao APP checkout shows that its installment payments (including Huabei installments) are still juxtaposed with payment methods such as Alipay and digital renminbi. Jiemian News asked Taobao customer service as a consumer and learned that Huabei Installment is a consumer credit service provided by Ant Financial.
The checkout counter of Dewu APP shows that its Dewu monthly payment, Huabei, and Huabei installment are still tied with WeChat payment, bank card payment, etc. Jiemian News asked Dewu customer service as a consumer, and the relevant customer service stated that Dewu Monthly Payment is essentially a consumer credit service, with financial support provided by licensed institutions.
In this regard, Wang Pengbo believes that the final time for rectification has not yet reached. If there are still platforms that fail to differentiate credit products after September 30, or do not meet the compliance requirements of the “Measures for the Administration of Online Marketing of Financial Products”, once discovered, the relevant platforms will face legal penalties.
