<![CDATA[Background: The rapid adoption of buy now, pay later (BNPL) services among university students has intensified concerns about budgeting, debt control, and responsible digital credit use. Objective: This study examines the associations of financial literacy, self-control, and pay-later use with financial management among Accounting students at the University of Bengkulu. Method: A quantitative cross-sectional survey was conducted using a five-point Likert-scale questionnaire. Participants were selected purposively from active Accounting students who had used at least one pay-later platform during the preceding three months. Of the 260 questionnaires distributed, 236 complete responses were obtained; after the prespecified residual screening reported in the source data, 217 responses were analyzed. Multiple linear regression was performed using IBM SPSS Statistics 26. Results: Financial literacy (B = 0.195; β = 0.177; p < 0.001), self-control (B = 0.554; β = 0.575; p < 0.001), and the composite pay-later-use construct (B = 0.152; β = 0.276; p < 0.001) were positively associated with financial management. The model explained 76.5% of the observed variance (R² = 0.765; adjusted R² = 0.762). Conclusion: Among the sampled students, stronger financial literacy and self-control were associated with better financial management. The positive coefficient for pay-later use should be interpreted as reflecting responsible and informed engagement, because the construct also includes risk awareness and usage literacy. The cross-sectional, purposively sampled design does not establish causality or population-wide representativeness.]]>
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