By Joseph Benedict Mensah | September 2026

A phone in April. A fridge in July. A laptop in September. Three ordinary purchases, three shops, three separate “yes” decisions on three unremarkable days — a modest deposit each time, nothing that would necessarily raise an eyebrow at a bank because no bank may ever see the full picture. Then one week in October, all three bills land within the same seven days. No single provider may have acted irresponsibly, and that is exactly the point: each decision can be made without a complete view of the household’s other obligations.

Buy-Now-Pay-Later (BNPL) financing is becoming increasingly visible in Ghana’s consumer market. It is marketed as convenience — a way to own a phone or other essential item without waiting months to save the full purchase price — and for many households it can genuinely work that way. But the model also raises a less visible risk: several individually manageable obligations can accumulate until the combined repayment burden exceeds what a household can comfortably absorb. The concern is not necessarily one catastrophic default. It is the gradual build-up of debt through several apparently manageable instalments.

How it gets a foothold

MTN Ghana’s Pick and Pay Later scheme allows eligible customers to acquire smartphones with a deposit and repay the balance over four or six months. The attraction is obvious for households and informal workers who may otherwise have to save for months before acquiring a device they need for work, education or communication.

That same convenience can make it easy to take on more than one obligation. Traditional credit applications often create a deliberate moment in which a borrower’s existing commitments are assessed. A fast digital or retail-financing transaction may involve much less friction. Where providers do not have a complete view of a customer’s obligations across different platforms, several individually reasonable commitments can accumulate into a much larger household liability.

The scale reached elsewhere in Africa illustrates the potential stakes. M-KOPA has reported extending more than ₦230 billion in credit in Nigeria and enabling about 290,000 first-time smartphone owners. In South Africa, Payflex offers interest-free instalment options that allow consumers to spread payments over defined periods. These models demonstrate both the demand for alternative consumer finance and the importance of regulatory safeguards as digital credit expands.

The arithmetic that breaks a household

Consider a household in Accra or Kumasi that would honestly describe itself as coping. A parent takes a phone on a financing plan for informal trading work — modest and manageable. Months later, the fridge fails and another instalment plan replaces it. When the school term begins, a laptop is added through a third arrangement. Each decision, considered separately, may be rational. But if no provider has a complete picture of the other obligations, the household can end up facing one large repayment burden assembled through several small decisions.

Behavioural economists describe part of this problem through present bias — placing greater weight on an immediate benefit than on a future cost — and mental accounting, where people mentally separate obligations instead of considering their combined effect on the household budget. A BNPL payment may therefore feel more like another monthly bill than debt. Yet missed repayments can carry consequences ranging from fees, depending on the provider, to restrictions on the financed asset.

International evidence shows why multiple simultaneous obligations deserve attention. A January 2025 study by the US Consumer Financial Protection Bureau found that about 63 per cent of BNPL borrowers in its dataset had multiple simultaneous BNPL loans at some point in 2022, while 33 per cent borrowed from more than one provider. That evidence is from the United States and should not be treated as proof of the prevalence of loan stacking in Ghana. It does, however, illustrate a risk Ghana’s emerging digital-credit market should take seriously.

When the phone goes dark

The consequences of default can also affect a borrower’s ability to recover. Under MTN Ghana’s published Pick and Pay Later terms, a financed device may be locked following non-payment. For a trader, driver or small-business owner who relies on a smartphone to earn income, losing access to the device at a financially difficult moment can deepen the pressure.

The wider household consequences are harder to measure and should not be assumed without Ghana-specific evidence. But repayment difficulties can potentially force families to redirect money from other essential expenses, delay purchases or absorb additional financial stress. This is precisely why consumer-credit regulation should consider the borrower’s total repayment capacity rather than only the affordability of a single transaction.

A regulator arrives — but only partway

Ghana introduced a dedicated regulatory framework for Digital Credit Services Providers through the Bank of Ghana’s Directive for Digital Credit Services Providers, 2025, which took effect on 1 November 2025. The framework introduced licensing requirements, minimum capital requirements, consumer-protection obligations and credit-information reporting. It represents an important step towards bringing digital lending under clearer regulatory oversight.

One provision is particularly relevant to the risk of multiple borrowing. The Directive requires digital credit providers to submit customer information to licensed credit reference bureaus daily, subject to the applicable consent requirements. However, reporting information after credit is granted and checking a borrower’s existing exposure before approving new credit are different safeguards. The Directive’s credit-information provisions do not expressly state that a provider must query a borrower’s existing exposure before every new digital loan is approved.

That distinction matters. A system can accumulate increasingly useful credit data while still allowing a customer to take on overlapping obligations before the information is actively used in an affordability decision. The regulatory question, therefore, is not simply whether providers report; it is whether the information available is used early enough to prevent harmful debt stacking.

What would better protect Ghanaian households

Three changes deserve consideration. First, digital-credit providers should be required to assess a borrower’s existing exposure before approving a new plan. This would help shift affordability assessment from the individual transaction to the borrower’s combined obligations. Second, providers should present the cash price and the total deferred-payment cost in a clear, standardised format before a customer commits. Third, consumers should receive reasonable notice and a defined grace period before a financed device is locked or another significant enforcement action is taken.

Providers also have commercial reasons to improve affordability checks. Better information about existing obligations can reduce default risk and improve the quality of lending decisions. Financial-literacy programmes should likewise describe BNPL for what it is: a form of credit. Such education should reach students, traders, gig workers and other consumers who increasingly rely on digital financial services.

Ghana’s regulators deserve credit for establishing a framework for digital credit. But a system that evaluates consumer finance one transaction at a time may still miss the cumulative pressure building inside a household. The next stage of regulation should therefore pay closer attention to total borrower exposure and repayment capacity. Until that happens, a series of manageable instalments can continue to conceal a much larger liability — the hidden balance sheet sitting inside the household budget.