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Zeeh Africa Revamps Direct Debit to Enhance Loan Repayment in Nigeria’s Digital Lending Sector
Addressing Nigeria’s Digital Lending Repayment Challenges
Nigerian fintech startup Zeeh Africa, specializing in open finance APIs that facilitate customer verification and bank data access, has relaunched its Direct Debit solution. This strategic move aims to strengthen payment infrastructure and tackle one of the most persistent issues in Nigeria’s digital lending ecosystem: improving borrower repayment rates.
Loan Defaults Rise Amid Growing Digital Lending Market
According to the Central Bank of Nigeria’s (CBN) Credit Conditions Survey for Q2 2025, there has been a noticeable decline in loan repayment performance, with an increasing number of borrowers defaulting on unsecured loans. The proliferation of digital lenders-whose numbers have more than doubled over the past two years-has made unsecured credit more accessible. However, the net balance of -1.5 in the report highlights a troubling trend of rising loan defaults, underscoring the need for more effective repayment mechanisms.
From Manual Follow-Ups to Automated Repayment Solutions
David Adeleke, CEO of Zeeh Africa, points out the paradox within Nigeria’s fintech boom: “While disbursing loans has become seamless, collecting repayments remains inefficient.” Traditional methods such as manual reminders and inconsistent bank transfers have perpetuated a cycle where reliable borrowers are unfairly grouped with defaulters, complicating recovery efforts.
How Direct Debit Transforms Payment Collection
Zeeh’s Direct Debit feature enables businesses to automatically withdraw payments from customers’ bank accounts on pre-agreed dates, contingent on customer consent. This automation is particularly vital in Nigeria, where, until recently, lenders relied heavily on manual collection efforts. The feature is proving essential for credit providers, buy-now-pay-later (BNPL) platforms, and subscription services that frequently face challenges with missed or irregular payments.
Origins and Evolution of Zeeh Africa’s Direct Debit
Founded in 2022 by David Adeleke and Frank Uwajeh, Zeeh Africa offers financial institutions tools to verify identities, access bank data, assess creditworthiness, and automate lending workflows. Recognizing the ethical and operational difficulties lenders faced in recovering loans, the founders initially launched Direct Debit in 2024 but paused it to redesign the system for better performance and tracking.
“We paused the product to develop a more robust system,” Adeleke explains. “The initial traction was unclear, so we focused on building a platform with comprehensive usage monitoring.”
Beta Testing and Market Adoption
In February 2025, Zeeh introduced a beta version of the revamped Direct Debit, enrolling 20 businesses spanning digital lenders, educational financing platforms, and subscription-based services. Since then, the product has expanded to support 22 companies. Overall, Zeeh’s suite-including identity verification, bank data access, credit risk analysis, and automated loan recovery-serves over 150 enterprises.
Adeleke highlights the platform’s scale: “Year-to-date, we’ve processed over 5 million API calls across our core products. Our strength lies in open banking capabilities-data sharing, KYC, credit insights from bureaus, and bank statement analysis.”
Innovative Features and Leadership Driving the Relaunch
Appointed CTO in October 2024, Jerry Nwosu played a pivotal role in the Direct Debit relaunch. The product offers two main functionalities: enabling customers to schedule installment payments with full consent from all parties, and allowing customers to authorize debit mandates specifying amounts and durations. Zeeh automates the entire repayment process, providing real-time updates on transaction statuses.
Product Manager Ogechi Mbaka notes, “Pay-later companies, despite strong underwriting, often struggle with payment collection. Our solution automates repayments, reducing reliance on large collections teams and lowering default rates that can reach 30%, all while ensuring transparency with customers.”
Compliance with Regulatory Standards
Zeeh’s mandate-based Direct Debit aligns with the Federal Competition and Consumer Protection Commission’s (FCCPC) digital lending regulations introduced in July 2025. These rules emphasize transparent, consent-driven repayment processes and prohibit aggressive or intrusive debt collection practices, reinforcing ethical standards in the fintech space.
Competing in a Crowded Market
Despite entering a competitive landscape dominated by established players like Flutterwave, Paystack, Monnify (Moniepoint), Kora, and Mono-all offering Direct Debit services-Zeeh aims to differentiate itself by providing an integrated credit journey. This includes identity verification, affordability assessments, bank statement analysis, and payment processing within a single infrastructure, eliminating the need for lenders to piece together multiple providers.
Future Expansion and Scaling Prospects
Looking ahead, Zeeh plans to broaden its Direct Debit capabilities by incorporating additional payment channels and extending its reach beyond Nigeria through UseZeeh, a unified API gateway for developers and businesses. The critical challenge remains how swiftly Zeeh can scale and capture significant market share from well-funded incumbents already facilitating recurring payments across Africa.
