Cushion provides an app that helps U.S. consumers negotiate bank and credit card fees and is expanding into bill pay to offer a single place to track, pay, and finance bills. The company reports more than 100,000 current customers and an additional six-figure waitlist for the new bill pay product. After months of beta testing, Cushion is preparing the bill pay solution for a general audience. Proceeds from its financing will be used to hire across product, engineering, data analytics, and marketing to support the rollout. Led by CEO Paul Kesserwani and based in San Francisco, Cushion aims to help consumers avoid overdraft and late fees through its bill management and fee-negotiation services. Cushion offers a consumer app that downloads users' transaction histories, identifies assessed bank fees, and conducts negotiations with banks to secure refunds. The company only takes a commission on returned cash, aligning its incentives with customers. Founder Paul Kesserwani formed Cushion in late 2016 and built its own infrastructure to avoid using Plaid, launching a new platform in early January 2018. Cushion says it has onboarded tens of thousands of users and has recovered more than $1 million in fees for customers since founding. The company raised seed capital and is hiring engineers and data scientists to build out AI recommendations. Longer-term plans include broader active management features—switching users to lower-fee accounts, adjusting bill timing to avoid shortfalls—and potentially working directly with banks to offer lower-cost customer service channels.

Total raised

$15M

Funding rounds

2

Latest round

Series A

Latest activity

May 2022