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I know this isn't really the point of the article, but to me it's mildly depressing to see so many companies jump on the Buy Now Pay Later bandwagon - you see i

I know this isn't really the point of the article, but to me it's mildly depressing to see so many companies jump on the Buy Now Pay Later bandwagon - you see it everywhere nowadays. Almost every "Add to Cart" button or checkout process is now adorned with "Pay in installments with <company name>". To me, it indicates the decreasing purchasing power of the average consumer, combined with the desire to still buy all the new things. Using the screenshot from the article as an example - if you have no other option but to finance a $125 pair of shoes over the course of two months, buying them is probably not the best financial decision at the moment.

Krasnol 3y ago
True. However, it seems to work quite well in the US, where people grow up with several credit cards in their wallet. I always wondered how far you can push that. Looks like we're about to find out.
- tavavex 3y ago
  At least with credit cards, you can use them wisely and still benefit from them (credit cards often have benefits that no debit card has, a high credit score can theoretically help you elsewhere, and so on). But I agree that neither credit cards nor BNPL were created with benevolent intentions - a lack of financial literacy seems to be fairly common, and these payment methods are used as ways to make people feel richer than they actually are, and spend accordingly.
  - waveBidder 3y ago
    The profit model for credit cards is still the same though; if no one was over-extended, there would be no surplus on which to provide perks to those who aren't. This is just point of sale companies getting in on the game and decreasing the friction of buying things.
cjs_ac 3y ago
I suspect the increasing proportion of online stores offering these deals is due to the increasing proportion of payment platforms (Stripe et al.) integrating with the buy-now-pay-later operators, and stores seeing no reason not to allow customers to pay using those methods. That said, a lot of these operators seem to be offering 0% interest: let's see how long that - and they - survive.

Krasnol 3y ago

True. However, it seems to work quite well in the US, where people grow up with several credit cards in their wallet. I always wondered how far you can push that. Looks like we're about to find out.

tavavex 3y ago
At least with credit cards, you can use them wisely and still benefit from them (credit cards often have benefits that no debit card has, a high credit score can theoretically help you elsewhere, and so on). But I agree that neither credit cards nor BNPL were created with benevolent intentions - a lack of financial literacy seems to be fairly common, and these payment methods are used as ways to make people feel richer than they actually are, and spend accordingly.
- waveBidder 3y ago
  The profit model for credit cards is still the same though; if no one was over-extended, there would be no surplus on which to provide perks to those who aren't. This is just point of sale companies getting in on the game and decreasing the friction of buying things.

cjs_ac 3y ago

I suspect the increasing proportion of online stores offering these deals is due to the increasing proportion of payment platforms (Stripe et al.) integrating with the buy-now-pay-later operators, and stores seeing no reason not to allow customers to pay using those methods. That said, a lot of these operators seem to be offering 0% interest: let's see how long that - and they - survive.