The instalment plan you were offered at the shop assumed you have a credit card. Statistically, you almost certainly do not — and that is the normal case, not a personal failing.
How rare are credit cards in Pakistan?
Rare enough that card-based lending cannot be the mainstream answer to anything.
The State Bank’s Payment Systems Review for the quarter ended 31 December 2025 counted 66.65 million payment cards in the country. Only 3.11 million of those were credit cards — about 4.7% of all cards, against 58.2 million debit cards.
Set that against an adult population of roughly 128 million and the picture is stark: fewer than one adult in forty holds a credit card, and one person may hold several, so the share of people is lower still.
Why the salary slip narrows the field
Getting a credit card requires income documented in a particular form, and that form is what most Pakistani workers do not have.
The Pakistan Bureau of Statistics puts informal employment at 80.8% of all employed people in its 2024-25 Labour Force Survey. Shopkeepers, tailors, drivers, farmers, freelancers, tuition teachers and anyone paid in cash are all earning — often well — with nothing a bank’s underwriting form can accept as evidence.
Karandaaz’s 2024 financial inclusion survey found 85% of adults rely on informal sources, mainly family and friends, for credit, and that only 9% of the still-excluded trust banks at all. The informal market is not a fringe. For most people it is the whole market.
Women are excluded twice over
The gender numbers deserve their own line, because they moved the wrong way.
Global Findex data for 2024 shows 11.9% of Pakistani women held an account against 42.3% of men. In 2021 the female figure was 13.5% — so women’s account ownership fell while men’s rose, and the gap widened to roughly 30 percentage points. Pakistan moved against the global trend, in which gender gaps narrowed.
Karandaaz adds the mechanism: 46% of women own a mobile phone against 82% of men, and 30% of women report no access even to someone else’s. Underwriting that starts from an account and a phone cannot see most women at all.
What card-free routes ask for instead
Every route that skips the credit card replaces it with a different form of security. Knowing which one is the point — because that is what you are actually handing over.
| Route | What it asks for beyond a CNIC | What it costs you |
|---|---|---|
| Dealer scheme | Two references, utility bill, physical verification, post-dated cheques | A dishonoured cheque is a legal matter, not a late payment |
| Retailer finance partner | Device-locking on the item itself | The phone stops working if payment slips |
| Wallet pay-later | Wallet transaction history | Short tenures, typically 60 days |
| Islamic bank financing | Account relationship plus a 5–50% down payment | Large cash sum on day one |
| Oraan Instalments | Identity verification, income confirmation, a bureau check | The first instalment before the money is released |
What Oraan asks for
Oraan Instalments is open to new customers — you apply through the app or the form and are onboarded from there, with no requirement to have used another Oraan product first.
The application asks for a CNIC, identity verification, confirmation of what you earn — a salary slip, or another record of your income if you are not salaried — and a credit-bureau check. The first monthly instalment is paid before the money is released.
What the credit card requirement excludes is people the card system never reached. What no responsible provider skips is the affordability question — because a plan you cannot carry for ten months helps nobody, least of all you.
What to do if a route turns you down
Three moves, and the first one is the most common fix:
- Get your identity verification right. A CNIC that fails automated verification blocks every regulated route, and a clean, current CNIC is the one document all of them require.
- Gather evidence of what you earn. If you have no payslip, assemble what you do have — bank statements, records of your business takings, rent receipts. The gap is usually in the evidence, not the income.
- Shorten the tenure, or save towards it instead. A five-month plan costs materially less in total than a ten-month one. And a committee reaches a lump sum without borrowing at all — slower, but it costs nothing at the later slots.
What none of this requires is a credit card. In a country with 3.11 million of them, no honest financial product could.
Provider requirements were checked on 10 September 2026 and change without notice. Confirm what a provider asks for directly with them.
Sources
- State Bank of Pakistan, Payment Systems Review Q2 FY26 — 66.65m payment cards, 3.11m credit cards, quarter ended 31 December 2025
- Pakistan Bureau of Statistics, Labour Force Survey 2024-25 — 80.8% informal employment
- World Bank Global Findex — account ownership by gender; the Pakistan series carries the 2024 figures
- Karandaaz Pakistan — Financial Inclusion Survey 2024, informal credit reliance and the phone-ownership gap
- Meezan Bank Consumer Ease — 5–50% down payment
- QistBazaar terms and conditions — references, verification and post-dated cheques
- PriceOye FinPro — device-locking on the financed item
- Oraan Instalments — what Oraan asks for
