Allowing Your Customers To Split Payment Across Credit Cards

I had heard about Anne Wojcicki’s (wife of Google co-founder Sergey Brin) Personal DNA testing a while back when it’s public launch was announced in the news. This weekend, out of sheer curiosity, I visited the website. So impressed was I by the design of this site, that I had to write about it.

Besides the simple, yet pleasing color schemes and layout, what struck me as the most surprisingly customer friendly feature was the order processing page. At the time of this writing, the cost of a DNA analysis from 23andme.com was quoted at over a thousand dollars – $1013.95 to be precise. The average customer would swallow a bug when confronted with such a large amount. However, the order processing page presents him with not 1 but 2 payment options.

• Pay with 1 credit card,
• Split payment onto 2 credit cards.

This is a long overdue feature in many of the popular online retailer websites today. By allowing the customer to split the payment with 2 credit cards, 23andme.com is ensuring that they are able to get the business of even the ‘not-so-rich-customers’ who many not be able to make a 1000+ $ payment using one credit card.

So what will it take for other online retailers to follow suit ?