payment = loan payment (a = loan amount, r = rate, n = periods)
The rate and periods should match each other – for example, if the period is a number of months, then the rate should be a monthly rate and the payment will be a monthly payment.
If you have the annual interest rate and want to know the monthly interest rate, simply divide the annual rate by 12. This is what most financial institutions will do. the compounded annual rate will end up being more that the annual rate you started with, but this is built into their advertised effective annual rate.