How to Increase Sales with an AI-Based Digital Lending Platform for Equipment Financing

May 15, 2026Blog Post, Financing Automation & AI

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EQUIPMENT FINANCING: OVERVIEW OF THE OPPORTUNITY

For equipment providers, at a time when customers are experiencing income interruptions, this statistic is even higher, due to the higher average item value and a higher likelihood to buy wholesale.

Whether a business is selling, manufacturing, or distributing medical, construction, retail, or any other type of equipment, in-house financing is the trend to follow and embrace due to the new developments in financial technology making the digital lending industry entry barrier lower than ever.

Currently many equipment providers aren’t able to offer adequate automated financing programs inhouse to their clients. The solution is TurnKey Lender’s end-to-end lending automation platform that allows businesses to quickly launch a bank-grade financing program while enjoying the usability of a SaaS.

Equipment Financing Platform by TurnKey Lender – Market-leading SaaS for in-house end-to-end lending automation.

With the adoption of socially-distant digital solutions, easily accessible financing options is now an even more important contributor to customer retention and business growth.

In-house financing is making a statement in the market with FinTech solutions allowing for easy automation of every step of the crediting process from intuitive SaaS interfaces.

In-house financing comes in many names these days:

But regardless of the name, they all allow for simply an agreement for a buyer to pay off a purchase in installments. Businesses can choose from a variety of business models available:

In-house Retail Financing
Rent-to-Own
Equipment Providers and Distributors
Lease-to-Own
Vendors
Dealerships
Manufacturers
e-Commerce
Leasing
Service Providers (such as: dental, plastic surgery, educational, etc.)

SERVICE THAT ADDRESSES THE MARKET DEMAND

Statistics say that in-house financing is especially attractive to younger consumers. Millennials — with harrowing recollections of their parents’ experiences in the Financial Crisis of 2008, and a pronounced (and apparently growing) fear of compounding their student-loans and other debt — aren’t as likely to own or use credit cards as their elders. As a means of obtaining unsecured financing, Millennials and their Gen Z juniors view credit cards as murky, restrictive, and unduly usurious.

Meanwhile, these young consumers have become big fans of POS installment loans, and have already entered the workforce making buying decisions on behalf of businesses. In outline, in-house installment loans harken back to the store-credit and “layaway” plans that householders commonly used to fund big and not-so-big purchases in the 1950s and 1960s, a period widely viewed as a Golden Age for the middle class, especially in the US.

From a business standpoint, consumer financing means collecting loan applications, processing them to understand the risks, coming up with the optimal conditions, offering a payment plan to buy goods or services, and then automatically collecting the money, with interest on the financing provided. And while it may sound hard to implement, every step of the lending process can now be automated.

Taken together, Millennials (40.6%) and members of Gen Z (35.1%), account for more than three-quarters of consumer installment borrowers in Australia, says market-research firm Roy Morgan. At the same time, financing is also catching on with older consumers worldwide. In this light, providing this credit option for consumers looks like an obvious choice for equipment providers that plan to stay in business for a while.

And with global digitization efforts skyrocketing to meet the new socially distant reality’s needs, the online financing trend is likely to keep on growing at an increasing pace. So the question is not whether or not consumers will require affordable and easy-to-use credit from their providers, it’s who will provide it to them.

From a business standpoint, in-house lending means collecting loan applications, processing them to understand the risks, coming up with the optimal conditions, offering a payment plan to buy goods or services, and then automatically collecting the money, with interest on the financing provided. And while it may sound hard to implement, every step of the lending process can now be automated.

We know how to make lending cloud-based and accessible to businesses and borrowers anywhere. We’ve been doing it for years. TurnKey Lender is pioneering the development of intelligent lending technology that enables fully contactless crediting for any type of business. Our solution can be launched within a day and from there, our intuitive SaaS solution powered by Al takes care of financing your clients or providing other credit products. This and the expert integration and configuration services are just some of the things TurnKey Lender has to offer.

Dmytro Voronenko,

CEO and Co-Founder of TurnKey Lender.

HOW IN-HOUSE FINANCING HELPS EQUIPMENT PROVIDERS WIN BUSINESS & OUTPERFORM THE COMPETITION

Equipment providers eyeing tech-enabled in-house financing stand to benefit in several key business areas, including:

Sales and order value: By giving businesses more time to pay, equipment financing effectively increases their buying power, leading to higher sales for business. One may also expect higher average order value as buyers can opt for higher-end products and services.
Cash flow: Whether a business opts for turnkey software to run the POS program, or turn to an outsourcer, a swift, accurate, and flexible credit-decision engine means less time between closing a sale and getting paid.
Fees: The greatest fee advantage in in-house financing is reserved for businesses that use lending technology rather than an outsourced solution.
Customer base: Having in-house financing for equipment, products, or services — especially when it lets business set its own criteria — means the ability to attract buyers who might either struggle to qualify for personal loans, or feel disinclined to commit to a lengthy wait period for approval.
Customer experience: Don’t underestimate the marketing value of providing an effective POS program. People talk, and they talk a lot about their good and bad retail experiences. A smart, customizable financing program helps create customer loyalty and long-term relationships.

Having invented e-commerce, and transformed banking and investing, financial technology is rapidly altering the lending landscape, making POS financing more prevalent, more attractive to customers, and easier for sales and support staff to use.

INCREASE EQUIPMENT SALES THROUGH IN-HOUSE FINANCING

So what’s fueling this impressive growth?

The advent of cloud and mobile functionality focused on equipment and manufacturing financing. Technology has changed the game for brick-and-mortar businesses of all sizes. Smart, user-friendly technologies backed by advanced underwriting methodologies help traditional providers compete effectively with e-commerce giants and rivals relying on outdated tech or paper-based processes.

Mounting distrust of credit cards, especially among consumers under 40, who are likely to see them as a path to long-term indebtedness.

APPEALING TO NEW AUDIENCES WITH BETTER TECHNOLOGY FOR IMPROVED RETENTION

For businesses, tech-assisted in-house financing has several advantages, such as:

It’s fast and easy: In-store loan applications are processed quickly, at any point of sale, before a purchase occurs — ditto for online purchases.
It’s getting popular: Thanks mainly to retail giants like Amazon and Walmart, which offer POS-financing options for online checkout, shoppers and sellers are more aware than ever before of POS-financing options, especially for bigger-ticket items.
It’s dynamic and up-to-date: Lending-software firms like TurnKey have automated administrative functionality and they’ve improved credit origination and processing with artificial intelligence and customizable scoring models.
It’s a positive step: Rolling lockdowns enacted to slow the spread of the coronavirus have also slowed global supply chains and commerce.

Fighting back, businesses are providing new financing options against an economic backdrop of a sharp recession and record unemployment.

MAKING IT AS EASY AS POSSIBLE

Convenience also contributes to the rise of POS financing. More than three-quarters of consumers surveyed by Citizens Financial Group in 2018 said access to a “simple and seamless point-of-sale experience” would increase the likelihood of their funding purchases through payment plans — overtly in preference to whipping out a credit card.

TurnKey Lender Equipment and Manufacturing Finance solution allows anyone to provide instant credit to their clients directly with an intuitive user interface and a proprietary AI-powered Decision Engine that ensures the lowest possible credit risks with the biggest potential growth spread.

HOW IN-HOUSE FINANCING WORKS FOR EQUIPMENT MANUFACTURERS & DISTRIBUTORS

Usually, in-house financing is a credit that gets paid out in a matter of months in equal installments. Then charge the down payment and collect the payments with interest every month. The reason why for decades most businesses outsourced financing to banks, credit unions, or alternative lenders was that evaluating credit risks accurately used to require analytical capabilities of an underwriting department.

Nonetheless running an in-house financing program becomes more and more popular with automation taking care of risk evaluation, credit decisioning, origination, servicing, collection, and reporting. That said, there are two fundamental approaches to in-house financing – in-house financing or involving a middleman in the form of a third-party that will finance the clients instead of the business itself.

The same way launching an e-commerce store became available to anyone, bank-grade lending automation isn’t only accessible to large-scale traditional financial institutions anymore, with advanced SaaS providers, like TurnKey Lender, offering intelligent end-to-end automation of lending to businesses in all verticals. Ready-made solutions which are as easy to deploy and operate and don’t put a strain on the operational cost thanks to advanced AI doing all the heavy lifting behind the scenes.

EQUIPMENT FINANCING: IN-HOUSE VS OUTSOURCING

Outsourcing financing to traditional and alternative lenders has been the only viable way to offer financing at scale and not dedicate an entire department to managing loans. Using a third-party means involving a middleman that, at best, keeps just a part of the interest. In that scenario the client doesn’t have a relationship with the business past the sale, it’s with the bank.

And for some businesses that’s the right way, because administering the loans means remaining in control of the entire operation and taking on all of the credit-related risks. After all, that’s the reason why up until recently only a large financial institution would be able to run all the checks and accurately evaluate the credit risks of each application.

It’s evident though, that in the digital age, crediting is becoming embedded into the operations of any business rather than a service from a third-party. As lending technology becomes developed enough to provide the market with intelligent easy-to-use SaaS solutions, business owners can finance their clients directly, originating the loans, servicing, and collecting payments on autopilot. While involving a third-party lender in this process may result in delays, loss of data, and reduced repeat sales.

Equipment providers and manufacturers are left with the mission-critical choice of how to go about providing this dynamic financing alternative. Essentially, they have to decide whether to hire an outsourcer or do it themselves.

The first option – outsourcing – is great for providers eager to avoid:

Having to wait for the money. For businesses that use POS-financing outsourcers, loan settlements are between the outsourcer and the customer. The business owner gets paid in whole quickly.
The intricacies of underwriting. With an outsourcer on deck, risk assessment and “decisioning” is built in.
Complicated financing. Outsourcers are great for “no frills” POS financing; less so for providers who want to probe alternative credit scoring, offer specials and other incentives in POS-lending programs to reach customers who — though not risky — might not qualify for financing using traditional underwriting rules.

Among POS outsourcers are Affirm, Bread, Lightspeed and, most famously perhaps, Square. The do-it-alone option sounds daunting unless you take into account fintech companies like TurnKey Lender that cater to this growing market with advanced, cloud-based lending functionality for POS financing – and in TurnKey Lender’s case, this proposition extends to SMEs of all types, not just the big guys.

Backed by best-practice workflows along with advanced credit-scoring and decision analytics, Turnkey Lender offers a number of advantages over other POS:

Improved portfolio yield from technology that lets the business optimize portfolio yield by working only with the most profitable customers along with predictive models to pinpoint optimal rates and terms.
Increased operational efficiency that’s supported by artificial intelligence to enable fast and smart decisions.
24/7 IT support and customer service to answer customers’ questions in real-time.
Mobile-lending capabilities via secure web app for on-the-spot customer service, whether at a cash register or at the far end of a vast showroom.
Affordability due to its modular structure. With TurnKey Lender, businesses can start small and add functionality as needed.
Scalability that lets the POS-financing program grow along with the rest of the business.

Another reason many business owners prefer fintech providers like TurnKey Lender over outsourcers is flexibility. Sign up with an outsourcer and in most cases, they make the rules around loan durations, financing types – loans, leases, or lines of credit — and interest rates. That makes it harder to tie purchasing incentives such as lower rates, grace periods, and promotions to their financing programs.

Last but by no means least, there is of course money to be made from lending. Providers that choose outsourcers as their partners in POS financing share the fees borrowers pay with these providers. Those that opt for a technology provider typically pay a subscription for the software-and-service package but keep the fees for themselves.

The in-house approach doesn’t just give business owners a “say” in what fees customers are charged, it gives total control over this and every other aspect of digital lending.

In business, losing control means losing money. So anyone thinking about providing customer financing to increase sales, needs to understand how taking control of fees can benefit their business by making financed purchasing more efficient, boosting customer loyalty and securing customers’ private information.

TECH-ENABLED, IN-HOUSE OPTIONS OFFER FULL CONTROL OVER THE FINANCING OPTIONS

But more and more manufacturers are choosing cloud-based lending technology for POS financing over outsourced solutions. This offers several advantages, including:

Enhanced data integrity and security. All client data is held strictly between business and its customers to cater to clients who demand complete confidentiality. It also allows no risk of customers getting lured away by competitors introduced to them on the loan-servicing web pages of third-party lenders.
Less checkout dropoff. A simple checkout process that doesn’t call for submitting additional applications to third parties increases the chance of the customer deciding to back out of the transaction.
Sensitive underwriting rules. The manufacturer sets their own criteria for credit decisions and controls which customers they want to approve while ensuring that interest rates are both profitable and adequate.
End-to-end lending automation – find a solution that allows for automation of the specific parts of the lending process as well as its entirety.
Proven track record – make sure that the provider has proven previous experience with similar projects and recognition from the industry.
Regulator-ready software – it’s important to consult a local regulations expert to see how selling products in installments is regulated where any given business operates. For example, in the US, there’s no need for FCA approval for b2b’s and offering financing services only to other incorporated businesses (not sole traders or small partnerships).

So the general rule of thumb applies, it’s important to know the rules prior to making any major decisions.

EQUIPMENT FINANCING WITH TURNKEY LENDER

The TurnKey Lender Retail solution allows anyone to provide instant credit to their clients with an intuitive user interface and a proprietary AI-powered Decision Engine that ensures the lowest possible credit risks with the biggest potential growth spread..

The cloud-based platform incorporates retailers’ order processing automation, business logic, and borrower portal needs in a single, integrated solution. And since retailers aren’t lending experts, we make sure the process is 100% automated.

THE TURNKEY LENDER EQUIPMENT FINANCING PLATFORM INCLUDE

End-to-end lending processes automation that can be up and running within a day.
A cloud-based SaaS platform accessible to borrowers and employees from anywhere and from any device.

Another important factor is the ability to use customers’ transaction records for more accurate credit decisions which may result in:

Operational efficiency supported by artificial intelligence to enable fast and smart decisions.
Optimized portfolio yield with technology that helps retailers identify the most profitable customers on the most favorable terms.
No transaction fees payable to third-party lenders — which can be as high as 15%.
Encrypted apps to ensure secure functionality at any location there’s wifi or mobile data.

An in-house approach to POS financing can also enhance brand loyalty. Using fully supported white-label technology, there’s no need to worry about customers getting confused by third-party documentation. In this model, touch points with the customers can be turned into opportunities for upselling and cross-selling, as well as enrollment in loyalty programs.

In-house lending can also bring artificial intelligence to bear on credit decisions. This can, in turn, provide more scope to approve loans in low-credit-risk sectors, such as healthcare. Third-party lenders can cost their clients on this front, rejecting applications with a historically strong likelihood of tipping into default.

This consideration highlights the fact that, along with points in favor, there are cons endemic to both approaches.

Using a third-party lender can mean depending on that company’s underwriting criteria with no control over such decisions. It can also compromise brand loyalty, lead to higher drop-off rates in reaction to onerous and time-consuming applications and hamper an operation’s ability to use data derived from many transactions to improve customer experiences.

Using an in-house lending solution means carving out an in-house credit department. And instead of collecting the purchase amount immediately, payment in full is deferred until the loan is retired.

HOW TO CHOOSE THE TECHNOLOGY TO RUN IN-HOUSE FINANCING PROGRAM ON

Launching an in-house financing program shouldn’t be a massive technological undertaking anymore. And the process for the client should be painless, so they want to come back.

Enrolling for a payment plan, getting approved, and receiving the purchase should all be done from an intuitive interface of a modern SaaS, not in Excel tables or on paper. The reliability, usability, and intelligence of the operation all depend on the system business ends up using to automate lending. Look for a solution with:

Built-in decision engine – the platform needs to have a flexible decisioning flow that can be adjusted to the specific business logic and to filter out potential defaulters early on.
Scalable infrastructure to process as many loan applications as needed without skipping a bit.
Affordable pricing – TurnKey Lender offers lending as a service platform where one pays a subscription fee based on the number of loans successfully processed.
Simple learning curve – both borrowers and employees are used to Amazon-level customer experience, modern lending platforms are built in accordance with the latest design best practices.
Integrated solution – to streamline the business operation, a single platform should be the central hub of all intel and analysis. Get a platform that combines multiple functions and allows for simple API integrations with different data sources, tools, services.
Available from the cloud – look for a platform that can be deployed on the cloud to be accessible to staff and clients from anywhere and on any device.
Comes with an AI-driven Decision Engine built-in. It includes proprietary scoring models and preconfigured integrations with major credit bureaus and bank statement providers. All this data processed by the machine learning algorithm allows for unmatched credit decisioning accuracy.
Lending automation with zero coding required. All configuration is done in a matter of clicks through the built-in Turnkey Force tools.
Advanced Vendor Management module for work with separate stores and merchants.
Create an unlimited number of credit products with granular settings to meet the specific customer needs, product details, and taxation requirements.
Different versions of the solution by business domains (retail, auto, medical) allow to find the optimal fit for each operation. And if custom functionality or advanced adjustments are needed, the TurnKey Lender team is there to tune the platform to the exact business’ specifications.
Intuitive workplaces for the employees and a Borrower portal. Every borrower will have a dedicated workplace with only the features they need available to them in the TurnKey Lender platform. And the borrowers will be able to track, repay, and apply for new loans in the Borrower portal.
Unify all web products and services with simple API integrations. – Other than the 75+ pre-configured integrations, TurnKey Lender comes with an advanced API client that allows it to integrate with any third-party products or services in a matter of clicks.

TurnKey Lender is pre-configured for intelligent automation of different credit products and lending models from a single platform allowing a variety of business models from retail finance and leasing, to renting and selling services with installment plans.

UNDERSTANDING THE DEFAULT FINANCING PROCESS WITH TURNKEY LENDER

With TurnKey Lender, businesses can put in-house financing on cruise control and focus on using it as a sales tool for business development. The entire in-house financing process can be as simple as that:

Communicate the details of the in-house financing program to the clients.
Convert leads through the configurable built-in application form.
Make a credit decision based on the intel the platform gathered.
Collect a down payment and approve the loan.
Receive payments automatically with the periodicity agreed upon with the client.
Build meaningful relations with the client with dedicated workplaces for the client

and the employees.

All the data is then stored in the platform and can be exported for reporting or

analyzed internally with built-in tools.

FINAL THOUGHTS ON GROWING BUSINESS WITH IN-HOUSE FINANCING

With the need for quality equipment returning to pre-Covid levels and in many industries outgrowing them, businesses are looking for credit options that would allow them to get the best equipment possible with affordable and easily accessible credit options. In-house financing already surpasses $100 billion a year. It’s fueled by FinTech-enabled intelligent innovation, customer convenience, and the ever-growing acceptance of financing technology.

Implementing an automated in-house financing program allows to:

Reach wider audiences thanks to the financing program making the product more affordable.
Add a new selling point for the product lineup for marketing purposes.
Move business operations online, collecting all the data in one place and allowing for advanced analytics.
Eliminate the middlemen in the form of a bank.
Build lasting relationships with returning customers who can be re-targeted with special offers, upsell, and cross-sell opportunities.
Increase profits by making it easier to buy more expensive things.
Regular payments received from borrowers will build a stable income source that combats income seasonality.

Equipment financing is a business opportunity that helps grow business’ bottomline while allowing for a payment option that customers are now expecting. TurnKey Lender can make this process automated and easy to manage and scale.

THE TURNKEY LENDER EQUIPMENT FINANCING PLATFORM

Improve your equipment financing with an AI-based lending platform that provides instant credit decisioning and automates manual processes to streamline customer experience and grow business.

Instantly approve credit applications for business customers and offer flexible lease and loan financing options.
Increase average order size and flatten income seasonality.
Grow customer lifetime value by offering an easy and effortless lending experience.
Offer an unmatched customer experience with intuitive web and mobile Interfaces.

The cloud-based platform incorporates the manufacturer’s order processing automation, flexible business logic, loan management, reporting, and customer portal in a single, integrated solution making the entire financing process 100% automated, quick, and easy to use.

TurnKey Lender provides manufacturers, distributors, and resellers with bank-grade credit decision automation for equipment financing, industrial machinery financing, medical hardware financing, manufacturing loan options, and more.

Enhance client’s customer experience with instant loan approval for machinery and equipment purchasing, new purchase orders, materials, or anything else in the product catalog.

Hyper-flexible credit product settings allow to roll out new programs and special offers for corporate and personal financing in a matter of minutes. Work with a variety of lending models including factoring, vendor finance, rent-to-own, lease-to-own, supplier financing, inventory financing, as well as fully custom credit products tailored to each business.

The TurnKey Lender Equipment Financing Platform is an AI-powered digital lending solution that provides automated, instant credit decisions and order processing, increasing revenue and average order size with a shorter buying cycle and streamlined client experience. Our technology is tailored to your unique business processes for fast, state-of-the-art ‘financing.

Elena Ionenko,

Co-Founder and COO at TurnKey Lender

Schedule a Personalized Live Demo Today.

TurnKey Lender Editorial Team

Founded in 2014 and headquartered in Austin, TX, TurnKey Lender provides a cloud-based, AI-powered lending automation platform that enables lenders to digitize the entire loan lifecycle. The solution delivers decisioning, origination, servicing, collections, and compliance in one unified system, helping banks, credit unions, FinTechs, and embedded lenders scale efficiently while staying compliant. TurnKey Lender serves a global customer base. Visit www.turnkey-lender.com to learn more.

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