The silent revolution of payments has just gained a new chapter: Automatic Pix, which was officially launched and will start operating on June 16. With him, a thesis we have defended since the novelty was announced was finally confirmed: he did not come to kill the bill, but rather to replace the old and problematic automatic debit.
The distinction matters. For more than two decades, automatic debit has been an unresolved promise of convenience. In theory, it would allow bills such as electricity, water, gas, phone, or subscriptions to be paid with a simple click, or not at all. But, in practice, it never came close to becoming a mass payment method. Only 11% of dealership consumers used automatic debit, and in lower-income segments, the rate is even lower.
The reasons are not hard to understand: trust in the collection company has always been low. The consumer has already experienced numerous negative experiences with wrongful charges, difficult cancellations, and little transparency in the debited amounts. The effect of these experiences is not limited to one sector: those who have had a problem with a telephone operator, for example, tend to carry that distrust to other services. This helps explain why so many avoid setting up automatic payments for even essential bills, like electricity and water. Add to this the so-called marginal propensity to consume of 1, where everything earned is spent, requiring the user to have autonomy to decide month by month what can or cannot be paid. Direct debit has never adequately addressed this reality.
Therefore, since Pix was launched in 2020, many experts, including us, argued that a recurring feature would be the final blow to automatic debit and not to the boleto as many had imagined. It would allow scheduling regular payments with more control, greater transparency, and, most importantly, more interoperability between payer and payee. On the 4th, during the Conexão Pix event held in São Paulo by the Central Bank, this thesis materialized.
The participation of companies like GloboPlay, Amazon, OLX, and Mercado Pago among the first to adopt Pix Automatic highlights the leading role of e-commerce in this new phase of payments. In the case of utilities, there is an expectation of growth in the number of automatic payments with Pix, but sector analysts estimate that this increase should not exceed 5%. The majority of consumers continue to prefer the boleto, which reinforces the structural limitations still present in this segment.
The model solves what might be the biggest pain point in the market: the integration between those who charge and those who receive. A traditional direct debit depends on agreements with banks, which imposes high costs and little flexibility. Automatic Pix is, by design, more democratic: the consumer only needs to authorize the recurrence. This changes the logic of new players entering the ecosystem, in addition to accelerating the digitalization of sectors previously hindered by analog infrastructure.
As Gabriel Galípolo, president of the Central Bank, stated:"Pix is the money that moves at the speed of our time."this new phase of Pix can do for recurring payments what the first wave did for instant transfers: universalize.
The confirmation of this thesis is symbolic for those who have been following the evolution of the Brazilian financial system. The boleto, with all its problems, still serves a critical function of reminder and control. Automatic debit ended up in the middle ground: neither as transparent as the boleto nor as convenient as Pix promises to be.
And for those who still doubt the speed of this transformation, it's worth remembering: Pix took less than four years to reach 160 million users. The Automatic Pix inherits this base and now has everything to become the new standard for automatic payments in Brazil. It is gratifying to see this vision being realized before our eyes, especially in e-commerce. Automatic Pix is not just a functional innovation. It is the victory of a fairer, simpler model more aligned with the behavior of Brazilian consumers.
*Vinicius Santos, founder and CEO of Conta Comigo DigitalGraduated in Economics from the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (UFRJ), Vinicius also has a degree in Philosophy from the Sorbonne University in Paris (FR). Currently founder and CEO of the fintech Conta Comigo Digital, he has led companies such as Navii.co, focused on the maritime sector, and Acordo Aéreo, a company with a platform capable of seeking compensation for consumers who have experienced issues with airlines.
