United States
With around 8,000 pawnshops operating in the United States, the $3 billion pawn industry remain a significant component of the alternative financial services sector. It’s expected to maintain a positive trajectory in the coming decade, underpinned by consistent demand for short-term, collateral-based lending as well as the sector’s adaptability to technological advancements. In short, pawn’s got staying power.
Still, despite its evergreen appeal, pawn is a complex market—fast-moving, highly regulated, and increasingly omnichannel. For ISVs developing pawnshop software, having the right payments integration can mean the difference between catching the tiger by the tail or getting eaten alive.
To stay competitive and support your merchants’ growth, you need a payments strategy built for flexibility, compliance, innovation, and modern customer expectations—all backed by a partner who understands this unique space.
Today’s pawnshops are evolving beyond the traditional storefront. Software providers must equip their clients with payment tools that meet a wide range of needs—from in-store terminals and layaway plans to mobile checkout, recurring payments, and ecommerce. The right payment strategy enhances software value, simplifies operations, and drives merchant retention.
Payroc is a leading integrated payments partner that enables ISVs to deliver omnichannel payment solutions through cloud-based APIs, embedded tools, and co-branded support programs. We help you serve your merchants better—and monetize payments along the way.
Serving Pawnshops Comes with Complexity—Your Payments Strategy Shouldn’t
As you know, pawnshops primarily make money by offering short-term loans against collateral and by reselling goods. This makes the business model naturally complex, with sales, loans, fees/interest, and redemptions all contributing to revenue and inventory. Your software must, of course, nimbly support all of the possible workflow and financial permutations, and your payments integration must be equally accommodating.
What’s more, because pawnshops are considered high risk by financial underwriters, your payments partner must be equipped to not only support pawn transactions but also help navigate the regulatory complexities while delivering fair processing rates.
In addition, many pawnshops deal in firearms and therefore must hold Federal Firearms Licenses (FFLs), adding yet more layers of compliance and complexity. Your payment partner should be equipped to support on-premise firearms transactions, including secure, compliant storage of firearms data, reporting that aligns with ATF audits, and differentiation between pawned, cosigned, or for-sale firearms.
Delivering Omnicommerce Tools That Drive Pawnshop Success
Like many retail businesses, pawnshops are transforming from bricks-and-mortar only to omnichannel. Yes, goods must still physically change hands and be stored and displayed, but the pawnshop itself is just one venue for customer interactions. The more sales avenues, the better.
- Online transactions are trending in the pawn industry, with some shops offering digital platforms for appraisals and sales. Apart from regulated merchandise (such as firearms, knives, and sometimes high-value jewelry), items can be sold and shipped nationally and even internationally, increasing a shop’s reach and thus revenue potential, especially for niche and collectible sales.
- Mobile sales tools also enable pawnshops to expand their reach. In addition to in-store and curbside flexibility, mobile point of sale allows for transactions at pop-up events, delivery and pick-up, remote loan repayment and item redemption, and more.
- Recurring and layaway payments enable merchants to offer flexible payment plans. To reduce payment failures and safeguard merchant cash flow, use automatic retries and card updaters. Build these flows directly into your software, or leverage prebuilt tools such as Payroc’s Recurring Billing Engine, which includes preconfigured billing logic with card updater services (to auto-refresh expired/lost cards), retry logic for failed transactions, and payment scheduling for layaway or loan repayment flows.
With the right payments integration, your software can empower merchants to meet buyers wherever they are—without complicating your development roadmap. Plus, a true omnicommerce payments integration delivers a standardized customer experience across channels and locations. On the merchant’s side, centralized tokenization supports cross-location redemption and re-engagement, making it ideal for multistore or franchise operators.
Empowering ISVs to Scale with Confidence
Payroc has the pawn industry experience you need to ensure a robust, scalable payments integration. We offer:
- FFL-Friendly, Scalable, and Secure Payments
Payroc underwrites and support merchants with firearm transactions—no workarounds required. We also provide simplified onboarding for high-risk merchants. And because we are Level 1 PCS DSS compliant, we own the compliance risk so you don’t have to. - Simplified Certification and Integration Options
While legacy hosted-only or siloed solutions delay go-lives, increase support tickets, and risk churn, our cloud-native, remote-key-injection platforms offer faster deployment, remote provisioning, and better uptime.
For ISVs looking for additional options, we also offer hosted fields, SDKs, and direct API integrations. With Payroc, you can also reduce your engineering burden with our wide array of pre-certified devices and low-code solutions.
- Smarter, Simpler Token Integration
Our enhanced token import capabilities allow you to switch providers and onboard new merchants more quickly than ever. Key features include direct, self-service file uploads, recurring revenue continuity, and preserved card-on-file data. - Omnichannel Sales
Payroc’s platform deftly handles and supports all payment types, including card-present, card-not-present, debit, ACH, mobile, and recurring—all from one integration. This allows you to keep everything under one roof for simpler onboarding and reconciliation. - Cash Discounting
With Payroc’s ConsumerChoice compliant dual pricing program, you can provide pawnshops with the ability to recoup credit and debit card processing fees. Pawnshop customers are in turn empowered with a choice—pay the listed card price or receive a discount for paying with cash. The displayed card price can cover processing fees (up to 4%), boosting both pawnshop profits and your software’s appeal. - Robust Reporting and Developer Tools
Our intuitive reporting tools and dashboards help your merchants understand trends and transaction history in real-time. For your development team, our developer-first resources speed implementation and reduce support needs. - Built-in ISV Revenue Opportunities
Monetize your payments program with revenue share. Payroc offers strong, customizable revenue opportunities for ISVs that make the most of your unique use case and vertical. When you partner with Payroc, you also gain a partner who supports go-to-market, merchant enablement, and retention. - Performance and Support You Can Count On
Payroc reports 99.999% uptime, maximizing transaction success and attendant revenue. What’s more, we provide U.S.-based support and white-glove onboarding to ensure your software performs.
Let’s Talk Pawnshop Payments
Payroc help pawnshop ISVs offer modern payments built for compliance, efficiency, and omnichannel success—FFL-friendly and ready to scale.
Reach out today to discuss how Payroc can help you streamline payments, serve merchants better, and grow your revenue.