BNPL Archives | PYMNTS.com https://www.pymnts.com/bnpl/2025/paypal-teams-with-will-ferrell-to-promote-updated-pay-later-program/ What's next in payments and commerce Thu, 10 Apr 2025 18:41:59 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.7.2 https://www.pymnts.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/11/cropped-PYMNTS-Icon-512x512-1.png?w=32 BNPL Archives | PYMNTS.com https://www.pymnts.com/bnpl/2025/paypal-teams-with-will-ferrell-to-promote-updated-pay-later-program/ 32 32 225068944 PayPal Teams With Will Ferrell To Promote Updated Pay-Later Program https://www.pymnts.com/bnpl/2025/paypal-teams-with-will-ferrell-to-promote-updated-pay-later-program/ https://www.pymnts.com/bnpl/2025/paypal-teams-with-will-ferrell-to-promote-updated-pay-later-program/#comments Thu, 10 Apr 2025 18:41:59 +0000 https://www.pymnts.com/?p=2682012 PayPal says it is adding new features to its buy now, pay later (BNPL) offering. To promote this new effort, the company announced Thursday (April 10), PayPal is rolling out an ad campaign featuring comedic actor Will Ferrell, due to launch this month. “Will’s signature humor will be on display as he embarks on a […]

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PayPal says it is adding new features to its buy now, pay later (BNPL) offering.

To promote this new effort, the company announced Thursday (April 10), PayPal is rolling out an ad campaign featuring comedic actor Will Ferrell, due to launch this month.

“Will’s signature humor will be on display as he embarks on a shopping journey to show all the ways you can pay with PayPal now and over time, with Pay Later available at merchants that accept PayPal,” the company said in a news release.

According to the release, this follows several updates designed to ease the PayPal checkout process, such as the ability to log in with biometrics and tap-to-pay options in partnership with Mastercard that let customers earn cash back.

The company is also launching what it calls its largest-ever sweepstakes with “The Great PayPal Checkout,” giving $10 million away by covering the purchases of up to $100 for 1,000 PayPal users for a 100-day stretch.

“Payments are no longer an afterthought, they’re a central driver in determining how consumers shop,” said Geoff Seeley, PayPal’s chief marketing officer. “With millions of consumers selecting PayPal every day, we’re committed to raising the bar and delivering an incredible, flexible, and rewarding experience that connects our customers to the things they want and love.”

Elsewhere in the pay-later space, recent research by PYMNTS Intelligence explores the popularity of BNPL among more affluent consumers, who use this payment method for both “need-to-have” and “nice-to-have” purchases.

While BNPL has cultivated an image of the favored method of cash-strapped consumers, the data shows a different reality, with 61.4% of Americans making more than $100,000 a year using this method for everything from designer clothing to porcelain veneers to overseas travel.

“While it’s not surprising that having more disposable income correlates with more spending on non-essentials, 13.5% of higher earners are using the payment method out of necessity,” PYMNTS wrote. “Maybe they have maxed out their credit cards and have an expensive auto repair. Maybe the card they want to use comes with perks and rewards that they want to tap into for another purchase.”

What’s clear, that report added, is that the alternative credit option has become mainstream for the bulk of higher earners. For example, last December, Klarna, a major player in the BNPL sector, announced partnerships with luxury retailers Neiman Marcus and Bergdorf Goodman.

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Beyond Credit Cards: How ‘Pay Later’ Momentum Is Reshaping the Payments Ecosystem https://www.pymnts.com/bnpl/2025/beyond-credit-cards-how-pay-later-momentum-is-reshaping-the-payments-ecosystem/ https://www.pymnts.com/bnpl/2025/beyond-credit-cards-how-pay-later-momentum-is-reshaping-the-payments-ecosystem/#comments Tue, 08 Apr 2025 08:01:59 +0000 https://www.pymnts.com/?p=2576877 Buy now, pay later (BNPL) isn’t just a niche payment option anymore — it’s rapidly becoming a permanent fixture in how consumers budget, shop and pay, according to five industry leaders whose insights preview the new eBook, “Reimagining Consumer Finance: The Strategic Rise of Buy Now, Pay Later.” Max Levchin, founder and CEO of Affirm, […]

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Buy now, pay later (BNPL) isn’t just a niche payment option anymore — it’s rapidly becoming a permanent fixture in how consumers budget, shop and pay, according to five industry leaders whose insights preview the new eBook, “Reimagining Consumer Finance: The Strategic Rise of Buy Now, Pay Later.”

Max Levchin, founder and CEO of Affirm, sees the sector evolving into a trusted, ubiquitous service — similar to how American Express became a household name in credit. In his view, consumers value BNPL’s predictability and sense of control over repayment more than the ability to borrow. Affirm’s model, Levchin says, focuses on clarity: “Our appeal is not that it’s some cool way of borrowing money,” but that it eliminates late fees and hidden costs while boosting merchants’ conversion rates and average transaction values.

Ed O’Donnell, CEO of Versatile Credit, highlights how economic headwinds have increased demand for pay-later financing.

“People want certainty — especially in an environment where things are a bit uncertain,” O’Donnell notes. Versatile Credit connects merchants with multiple lenders, enabling them to offer short-term and promotional financing that appeals to cost-conscious consumers, especially younger shoppers wary of high interest rates. Larger retailers once dominated this space, but O’Donnell has observed smaller merchants embracing BNPL to stay competitive and increase sales.

From a technology standpoint, Todd Pollak, chief revenue officer at Marqeta, believes modernizing outdated payment infrastructure is driving BNPL’s explosive growth.

“Even the networks and their operating procedures are based on code from 50, 60 years ago,” Pollak says. Marqeta’s application programming interface (API)-driven platform supports BNPL’s real-time capabilities and seamless integrations with digital wallets. This reduces merchant friction, Pollak adds, which remains a key hurdle. Regulatory scrutiny is inevitable, but centralizing risk management and compliance within technology platforms can help BNPL providers stay ahead of new rules.

Meanwhile, Mastercard is embedding installments directly into its global network, explains Seema Chibber, the company’s executive vice president for Core Payments in North America. Chibber sees BNPL as a “core capability” rather than a side offering, pointing to heightened consumer demand for installment-based flexibility across all types of transactions — from eCommerce to healthcare. By partnering with both FinTechs and traditional financial institutions, Mastercard aims to provide a universal framework that makes BNPL seamless for merchants.

“We’ve literally seen an explosion in the preference for installments,” Chibber says, underlining the demand for control and transparency.

Finally, Nandan Sheth, CEO of Splitit, believes the market is fragmenting as consumers seek new BNPL models and banks enter the space. Splitit’s approach leverages existing credit lines for interest-free installments, a strategy Sheth says fosters loyalty while preserving credit card rewards.

He notes that large banks are looking to partner with orchestrators like Splitit, smoothing integration and offering a unified point-of-sale experience. Sheth also points to Klarna’s success in evolving from a mere financing tool into a consumer shopping hub as a sign that BNPL’s future lies in more than just splitting payments — it’s about capturing and retaining consumer attention.

Collectively, these five perspectives paint a picture of a rapidly maturing BNPL industry poised for mainstream adoption — and they form the foundation of our new eBook, which delves deeper into how installment-based payments may shape the future of retail, banking and beyond.

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Fashion Retailer Revolve to Add Affirm’s Pay-Over-Time Option https://www.pymnts.com/bnpl/2025/fashion-retailer-revolve-to-add-affirms-pay-over-time-option/ https://www.pymnts.com/bnpl/2025/fashion-retailer-revolve-to-add-affirms-pay-over-time-option/#comments Wed, 02 Apr 2025 20:43:02 +0000 https://www.pymnts.com/?p=2540771 Fashion retailer Revolve Group will soon enable its customers in the U.S. to use Affirm to pay over time. The retailer will add this payment method in the U.S. in the coming days, both online and in its mobile app, and plans to then expand it to its customers in Canada and the U.K., the […]

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Fashion retailer Revolve Group will soon enable its customers in the U.S. to use Affirm to pay over time.

The retailer will add this payment method in the U.S. in the coming days, both online and in its mobile app, and plans to then expand it to its customers in Canada and the U.K., the companies said in a Wednesday (April 2) press release.

“Shopping should be effortless, and payment flexibility is a key part of our premium experience,” Revolve Group Co-founder and Co-CEO Mike Karanikolas said in the release. “Affirm stood out for its transparent approach, customized and flexible options, and proven ability to build trust with millions of loyal shoppers.”

Customers will be able to select Affirm at checkout, complete an eligibility check and, if approved, choose from biweekly or monthly payment plans, according to the release.

“Unlike most credit cards and other pay-over-time options, Affirm never charges late fees, hidden fees or compound interest,” Pat Suh, senior vice president of revenue at Affirm, said in the release. “As shoppers refresh their wardrobes for the warmer months, Affirm provides Revolve customers with the confidence to secure the styles they love with flexible payment options.”

More than 55 fashion merchants have integrated Affirm and begun offering it at checkout over the last six months, according to the release.

Buy now, pay later (BNPL) is one of the embedded finance features that are emerging as top priorities for payment facilitators, independent software vendors and marketplaces, according to the PYMNTS Intelligence and Fiserv collaboration, “How Embedded Finance Drives Retail Platform Innovation.”

The report found that BNPL and other embedded finance features have become a priority as firms strive to continuously enhance their payments acceptance offerings to meet customers’ expectation for smooth online buying experiences.

For consumers, the lure of paying over time lies with the predictability of the payment, as they see a point at which all has been paid off, Affirm founder and CEO Max Levchin told PYMNTS CEO Karen Webster in an interview posted Thursday (March 27).

“The appeal of pay later is not that it’s some cool way of borrowing money,” Levchin said. “It’s the sense of control around the schedule and the plan that you create.”

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Klarna Brings BNPL to High-Speed Rail With Eurostar Partnership https://www.pymnts.com/bnpl/2025/klarna-brings-bnpl-to-high-speed-rail-with-eurostar-partnership/ Wed, 02 Apr 2025 12:50:29 +0000 https://www.pymnts.com/?p=2540322 Pay-later platform Klarna has launched a partnership with rail service Eurostar. The collaboration, announced Wednesday (April 2), lets travelers in the U.K. and France split the cost of their tickets into three interest-free payments, and marks Klarna’s first time working with a train provider. “Eurostar has changed the way we travel between the UK and Europe … now Klarna […]

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Pay-later platform Klarna has launched a partnership with rail service Eurostar.

The collaboration, announced Wednesday (April 2), lets travelers in the U.K. and France split the cost of their tickets into three interest-free payments, and marks Klarna’s first time working with a train provider.

“Eurostar has changed the way we travel between the UK and Europe … now Klarna is changing the way we pay for it,” Raji Behal, head of Klarna’s western and southern Europe operations, said in a news release.

“Whether you’re heading to Paris for a weekend getaway or Brussels for business, you can now check out with Klarna and choose to pay in full or split the cost over time.”

The release notes that the partnership is happening as Eurostar is seeing an increasing number of travelers use its service, following a year in which it carried a record 19.5 million travelers.

While the new agreement marks Klarna’s entry into the rail sector, the company is no stranger to the travel industry. Last year, Klarna launched partnerships with travel website Expedia and luggage/travel accessory company Brand Away.

Research by PYMNTS Intelligence has found that buy now, pay later (BNPL) offerings such as Klarna have made significant inroads into the travel space. Nearly 20% of consumers surveyed said they opted to use BNPL as a payment option, according to “The Credit Economy: How Consumers are Approaching Holiday Spending and Travel,” a collaboration between PYMNTS Intelligence and i2c.

In other pay-later news, PYMNTS explored the evolution of the sector in a conversation posted Wednesday with Splitit CEO Nandan Sheth.

As he told PYMNTS CEO Karen Webster, “things are fairly fragmented right now,” especially for consumers who look to use transactional credit, seeking longer-term loans from a bank, and then for one-off solutions, moving toward traditional point-of-sale (POS) lenders.

All the same, Sheth added, there are few principles that remain as consumers search for merchants and find deals.

“If I’m a dominant credit provider, whether it’s Klarna or a J.P. Morgan Chase, there’s a value and a utility in consolidating the credit needs of a consumer off of my [own] platform,” Sheth said. “You’ll see more of that happening, and consumers will find it easier to deal with their trusted credit providers.”

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Klarna Offered 15 Million Warrants to Seal Walmart Partnership https://www.pymnts.com/bnpl/2025/klarna-offered-15-million-warrants-to-seal-walmart-partnership/ https://www.pymnts.com/bnpl/2025/klarna-offered-15-million-warrants-to-seal-walmart-partnership/#comments Tue, 01 Apr 2025 10:52:52 +0000 https://www.pymnts.com/?p=2539609 Klarna is reportedly facing backlash ahead of its $15 billion initial public offering (IPO). As the Financial Times (FT) reported Tuesday (April 1), some of that negativity stems from the Swedish FinTech’s recent buy now, pay later (BNPL) deal with DoorDash. The partnership, the report said, led to a wave of social media jokes, with […]

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Klarna is reportedly facing backlash ahead of its $15 billion initial public offering (IPO).

As the Financial Times (FT) reported Tuesday (April 1), some of that negativity stems from the Swedish FinTech’s recent buy now, pay later (BNPL) deal with DoorDash.

The partnership, the report said, led to a wave of social media jokes, with people comparing the idea of incurring debt to cover food deliveries to the subprime loans at the root of the 2008 financial crisis.

Klarna CEO Sebastian Siemiatkowski defended the arrangement on X: “DoorDash offers many products beyond food! . . . I know we are most famous for pay in 4. But you can use a credit card at DoorDash as well.”

This backlash, the FT report argues, spotlights the debate and skepticism around BNPL loans. Advocates view Klarna’s upcoming U.S. IPO as a milestone in BNPL’s journey to become a consumer finance staple

Critics of BNPL, the report adds, say there are vulnerabilities to this short-term and interest-free style of lending, such as weaknesses to consumer downturns and sensitivity to increased interest rates, which in turn increase funding costs.

The report also focuses on Klarna’s recent partnership with Walmart, which already had an arrangement with rival BNPL company Affirm. To land that deal, the FT said, Klarna offered Walmart 15.3 million warrants that can be converted into Klarna stock, valued at $500 million.

Dan Dolev, an analyst at Mizuho, labeled the announcement as “a publicity stunt” aimed at driving up sentiment before Klarna goes public.

“It’s really an expensive press release,” said Dolev. 

The Klarna IPO is happening at a time when the U.S. market for BNPL services is ballooning. 

PYMNTS Intelligence research has shown that market totaling $175 billion. It’s a small portion of consumer spending, but still  represents an 88-fold spike in BNPL over just six years.

“Growing consumer demand for fixed installment plans when they make a purchase is fueling hot competition among FinTechs and traditional banks, not just for consumer wallets but also for ties with merchants,” PYMNTS wrote last month. “The pay later ecosystem is rapidly evolving to change how Americans shop and merchants sell goods and services.”

The research — from the PYMNTS Intelligence special report “Pay Later Revolution: Redefining the Credit Economy” — finds that 51.2% of American consumers who use BNPL do so out of necessity, compared to 46.1% who use it out of convenience.

These findings, PYMNTS wrote, demonstrate that “BNPL is no longer the exclusive provenance of shoppers with crimped pocketbooks.”

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From 1960s Tech to 2025 Transactions: The Infrastructure Leap Powering BNPL’s Boom https://www.pymnts.com/bnpl/2025/from-1960s-tech-to-2025-transactions-the-infrastructure-leap-powering-bnpls-boom/ https://www.pymnts.com/bnpl/2025/from-1960s-tech-to-2025-transactions-the-infrastructure-leap-powering-bnpls-boom/#comments Mon, 31 Mar 2025 08:01:48 +0000 https://www.pymnts.com/?p=2520113 As this week’s “Pay Later Unpacked” virtual event draws to a close, we’ve heard a lot from the consumer-facing side of the house, as consumers are defining the use cases and payment preferences that drive this new format. We’ve heard a lot about how buy now, pay later (BNPL) services have fundamentally transformed consumer lending […]

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As this week’s “Pay Later Unpacked” virtual event draws to a close, we’ve heard a lot from the consumer-facing side of the house, as consumers are defining the use cases and payment preferences that drive this new format.

We’ve heard a lot about how buy now, pay later (BNPL) services have fundamentally transformed consumer lending by underwriting individual transactions rather than consumer credit profiles themselves.

But as the week closes out, let’s give payment processors their due. The BNPL revolution wouldn’t be possible without modern payment processing infrastructure that bypasses decades-old financial systems.

According to Todd Pollak, chief revenue officer at Marqeta, the payment processing landscape has required significant innovation to accommodate the rapid growth of BNPL services.

“Most of the technology and infrastructure for payments that merchants use is built on systems and structures that were put in place in the 1960s and ’70s,” Pollak said in a recent interview. “Even the networks and their operating procedures are still based on code that was developed almost 50, 60 years ago.”

This legacy infrastructure wasn’t designed to handle the unique requirements of BNPL transactions, creating barriers to adoption. Marqeta has positioned itself as a critical enabler in this space by developing solutions that work around these limitations.

“One of the amazing innovations that Marqeta brings to the market that’s enabled the growth of BNPL is that we figured out creative ways to manage it and overcome some of the limitations that it has in order to really drive penetration at merchants,” Pollak said. “Without a Marqeta, BNPL probably doesn’t exist in the form or the size and scale that you see it at today.”

The growth has been substantial, with Pollak noting that the BNPL industry now represents about “$18 billion in loans” developed over just “five to 10 years” as the payment method “exploded in popularity.” Pollak said he sees continued opportunity for both merchants and BNPL providers, with Marqeta “at the center of that in terms of powering the industry.”

Traditional Finance and BNPL Convergence

At that center, the line between traditional lending and BNPL continues to blur as established financial institutions seek to enter the space. This convergence presents significant technological challenges, according to Pollak.

“If you are on legacy infrastructure that you’ve been processing payments on for your entire history, you are now trying to figure out: ‘How do you get access to wallets?’” Pollak said, noting that Apple Pay and Google Pay, for example, are not set up for BNPL transactions tokenized in the cloud. This technological gap has established financial institutions looking for solutions.

“Legacy providers, whether that be traditional banks, traditional credit providers, issuers coming to Marqeta and probably others, are asking questions about how they would get access to real-time capabilities,” Pollak said. “They want real-time APIs (application programming interfaces) so that they can participate in the new economy.”

At the heart of Marqeta’s strategy is removing friction for merchants, and those frictions are identified by Pollak as “truly the choke point in BNPL.” The complex web of systems integration presents significant challenges.

“You need access to all the systems on the merchant side in order to complete that transaction and fulfill that order,” he said. “So that means inventory management systems, being able to pass the order value, being able to pass the shipping address, making sure that order gets fulfilled, and then there are returns. We focus a lot on that merchant experience and eliminating that friction.”

Navigating Regulatory Uncertainty

The regulatory landscape for BNPL remains in flux, creating challenges for providers. “Government is always behind the innovation curve,” Pollak said. “Risk and compliance and regulation tends to follow these very, very fast-growing technology companies who have disrupted a space.”

Despite the uncertainty, Pollak believes the industry is adapting. “We’ve seen some of what I will call gray area regulations around, is this true credit? Is it true lending? What does that mean for consumers and how you have to protect them? But I do think that the industry has adapted.”

For BNPL providers, scaling operations while maintaining effective risk management presents significant challenges. Marqeta addresses this by centralizing certain functions across the ecosystem.

“The cost of scaling your regulatory risk compliance operations inside of your company is a significant cost,” Pollak said. “As a central operator servicing all BNPL providers, we are a full program manager, and we are investing in our own risk and compliance capabilities.”

This approach allows BNPL providers to focus on their core strengths, which Pollak said are advancing underwriting, upgrading the merchant value proposition and upgrading the consumer value proposition.

Future of Embedded Finance

Looking ahead, Pollak sees BNPL as just one aspect of the broader trend toward embedded finance, with innovations continuing to expand financial inclusion.

“[There are] really, really clever companies that are figuring out how to take advantage of all these new capabilities that exist with modern providers who are doing things in real time through APIs in the cloud that enable them to think differently about how they assess risk, how they manage risk and how they provide capital to folks that frankly have very thin file that a bank would never, never consider doing,” Pollak said.

“Our job, as we see it, is to provide the tools and the infrastructure, but we are reliant on the innovators that are out there to take the capabilities that we’ve put together and be thoughtful about how they bring those to bear for consumers,” he said.

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Versatile Credit CEO: Economic Uncertainty Drives Pay-Later Merchant Benefits https://www.pymnts.com/bnpl/2025/versatile-credit-ceo-economic-uncertainty-drives-pay-later-merchant-benefits/ Fri, 28 Mar 2025 08:02:01 +0000 https://www.pymnts.com/?p=2519646 Here’s the net-net on the pay-later economy: The predictability of paying for purchases over time in fixed monthly installments is appealing to consumers who value the ability to manage their personal cash flow. But what do merchants like about it? As Versatile Credit CEO Ed O’Donnell told Karen Webster, merchants are using credit to drive […]

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Here’s the net-net on the pay-later economy: The predictability of paying for purchases over time in fixed monthly installments is appealing to consumers who value the ability to manage their personal cash flow. But what do merchants like about it? As Versatile Credit CEO Ed O’Donnell told Karen Webster, merchants are using credit to drive sales.

Versatile Credit, partnering with dozens of lenders to deliver financing options at the point of sale, has seen a steady drumbeat of merchants signing up to broaden the payments choices they can offer customers, who have spending power and credit “dry powder” to keep commerce going.

The platform, he noted, presents an opportunity for consumers to finance their chosen purchases  with enterprises that might not have previously been able to offer a range of credit options. Application volumes, as measured in January and February of this year, are up year over year, said O’Donnell.

“We’ve seen recovery in the verticals where we play today,” he told Webster as part of the PYMNTS on Air event, “BNPL: Pay Later Unpacked,” adding that “consumers are still being intelligent about how they use financing — short-term financing and promotional financing — to help make the purchases that they feel they need to make or they want to make.” That’s especially true of younger consumers who want to avoid interest payments that will turn a $1,000 purchase into a $3,000 transaction over several years.

And against that backdrop, said O’Donnell, no matter the type of plan on offer, “people want certainty — especially in an environment where, economically, things are a bit uncertain. Planning is important and confidence is important — [and with pay later] you can create your own confidence within your own budget.”

Shifting Profiles

The profiles of the merchants connecting to lenders via the Versatile Credit platform are changing too.  O’Donnell noted that a few years ago, larger retailers dominated; now that’s shifted to include small and mid-sized businesses. Providers such as O’Donnell’s firm also offer white-label offerings so that lenders can bring far-ranging credit offerings to merchants.

“When we started,” several years ago, said O’Donnell of Versatile Credit, “as just the supply side of the business — we could route consumer data to willing lenders and they could make credit decisions. It was all pretty much done in a vacuum.” But newer data driven models marry different subsets of information to predict how people will pay.

“If I’m on the lender side,” said O’Donnell, “I can be more aggressive with a general credit box if I pair up with other lenders, and if I’m on the merchant side, now I don’t have to be a larger enterprise to go out and get a really comprehensive credit programs — without ‘a big spend,’ and lenders support me coming onto the Versatile platform to get the same credit products that big enterprises have available to them.” The net impact is that there’s a swath of lenders presented to the end customer, from banks offering credit lines of several thousands of dollars down to short-term, buy now, pay later (BNPL) products.

“They’re complementary rather than completely competitive, the way it used to be,” O’Donnell told Webster, which in turn enables consumers to pay for elective medical procedures or home improvement products.

The actual connectivity between the lender and the merchant has shifted with the boon of technology too, said O’Donnell, who told Webster that the traditional, age-old, paper-based onboarding and manual underwriting has been improved by alternative data and artificial intelligence (AI). And that, said O’Donnell, can help speed the financing of, say, fixing a hole in the roof when the contractor’s standing in the middle of the kitchen, and the homeowner has to decide what to do.

“Showing and telling the customer [what’s available] and bringing technology into that compliant flow guarantees that the consumer is getting all the disclosures they need — and that the best available products are being put in front of them so they can say yes or no … every screen and sentence that’s disclosed in the credit process is approved by compliance and legal departments.”

The enhanced data and risk analysis also means, said O’Donnell, that lenders can expand the consumer populations they reach — as a traditionally subprime lender, for example, can move “upscale” and make offers that they might not have gotten in a different era of lending, and thus capture profitable, loyal (and new) prospects.

“The ability of merchants to offer more products will drive sales,” said O’Donell, “and that’s going to hold true even if things get a bit more chaotic and uncertain. The consumer also values having choices.”

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Affirm Forms BNPL Pact With J.P. Morgan Payments https://www.pymnts.com/bnpl/2025/affirm-forms-bnpl-pact-with-j-p-morgan-payments/ https://www.pymnts.com/bnpl/2025/affirm-forms-bnpl-pact-with-j-p-morgan-payments/#comments Tue, 25 Mar 2025 16:19:15 +0000 https://www.pymnts.com/?p=2517818 Affirm is expanding its pay-later offering via a new agreement with J.P. Morgan Payments. With this partnership, announced Tuesday (March 25), Affirm’s solutions become available to merchants on the J.P. Morgan Payments network in the U.S., letting them offer the company’s buy now, pay later (BNPL) plans at checkout. According to the companies’ announcement, the […]

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Affirm is expanding its pay-later offering via a new agreement with J.P. Morgan Payments.

With this partnership, announced Tuesday (March 25), Affirm’s solutions become available to merchants on the J.P. Morgan Payments network in the U.S., letting them offer the company’s buy now, pay later (BNPL) plans at checkout.

According to the companies’ announcement, the collaboration is happening amid increased adoption of Affirm’s services, with its active customer numbers reaching a record 21 million, up 23% year over year.

“The demand for diverse payment options, flexibility, and seamless transactions from both merchants and their customers is at an all-time high,” said Michael Lozanoff, global head of merchant services at J.P. Morgan Payments.

“By incorporating Affirm as a payment method into our Commerce Platform, we are empowering businesses to deliver the services they need and the experiences that customers increasingly expect as part of their retail journey,” he added.

The partnership comes nearly a week after Affirm announced it would begin furnishing information about all of its payment plans to Experian starting April 1.

“Having all loans reflected in a consumer’s financial profile will help protect and empower borrowers,” Libor Michalek, Affirm president, said in a Wednesday (March 19) news release.

”The buy now, pay later industry must evolve from simply providing flexible payment options to helping consumers build their credit histories and better manage their finances, and we are pleased to be taking this step with Experian,” Michalek said.

The company said this expanded credit reporting will help consumers build their credit histories, while letting consumers and lenders make more informed decisions.

As PYMNTS wrote soon after, Affirm’s decision here is part of a growing movement toward including BNPL loans in credit and underwriting decisions.

In February, FICO said it would work to add BNPL data to its credit scoring analysis. That company had teamed with Affirm on studies showing that — for the 85% of consumers who had opened a new BNPL account — there was generally a consistent impact on their FICO scores.

That research also found that impacts on FICO Score predictiveness ranged modest improvements to no negative effect.

“The additional impact of having BNPL included in credit scoring may be that consumers will be averse to “stacking” short-term loans, with an eye on keeping their debt loads more manageable and boosting their credit scores at the same time,” PYMNTS wrote.

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DoorDash Launches Flexible Payment Options With Klarna https://www.pymnts.com/bnpl/2025/doordash-launches-flexible-payment-options-with-klarna/ https://www.pymnts.com/bnpl/2025/doordash-launches-flexible-payment-options-with-klarna/#comments Thu, 20 Mar 2025 18:13:40 +0000 https://www.pymnts.com/?p=2515311 Buy now, pay later (BNPL) options from Klarna will soon be available for DoorDash orders. The payments company announced its new integration partnership with the delivery platform in a Thursday (March 20) press release, saying it offers DoorDash customers in the U.S. flexibility and convenience when paying for delivery of restaurant food, groceries and retail […]

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Buy now, pay later (BNPL) options from Klarna will soon be available for DoorDash orders.

The payments company announced its new integration partnership with the delivery platform in a Thursday (March 20) press release, saying it offers DoorDash customers in the U.S. flexibility and convenience when paying for delivery of restaurant food, groceries and retail goods.

According to the release, in the coming months (it didn’t specify when), DoorDash.com and DoorDash app users will have access to three payment options: “Pay in Full,” “Pay in 4” and “Pay Later.”

As it implies, Pay in Full means the customer pays the total amount of their purchases immediately through Klarna’s payment system. Pay in 4 divides the total cost into four equal and interest-free installments. The Pay Later option enables customers to defer their payments as their personal finances will allow.

“Our partnership with DoorDash marks an important milestone in Klarna’s expansion into everyday spending categories. By offering smarter, more flexible payment solutions for groceries, takeout, and retail essentials, we’re making convenience even more accessible for millions of Americans,” Klarna Chief Commercial Officer David Sykes said in the release.

The new BNPL integration can be used to pay for the expanding array of products available through DoorDash, including electronics, home improvement supplies and beauty products, according to the release.

Consumers can also use Klarna’s payment solutions for their DashPass Annual Plan, which offers benefits like free delivery and exclusive deals.

DashPass includes “added streaming and ride benefits at no extra cost,” Anand Subbarayan, head of money products at DoorDash, said in the release.

The partnership announcement comes on the heels of news that Klarna is moving toward an initial public offering (IPO) in the U.S.

It remains to be seen how the new payment options will impact the workflow of the people who deliver for DoorDash. “Dashers” in New York will be receiving a $16.7 million settlement amid accusations that the company deceptively used customer tips to subsidize wages between 2017 and 2019, rather than letting drivers keep their tips in addition to their guaranteed pay.

In a statement, DoorDash said it no longer uses the pay model from that time period.

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Adyen and Affirm Expand Partnership to UK https://www.pymnts.com/bnpl/2025/adyen-and-affirm-expand-partnership-to-uk/ https://www.pymnts.com/bnpl/2025/adyen-and-affirm-expand-partnership-to-uk/#comments Thu, 20 Mar 2025 10:59:15 +0000 https://www.pymnts.com/?p=2514876 Global payments platform Adyen and BNPL platform Affirm have extended their partnership into the U.K., a move designed to help British merchants offer consumers more flexible payment options. Under the expanded collaboration, Adyen’s merchant customers in the U.K. can now integrate Affirm’s installment payment services directly into their checkout systems. Affirm’s payment plans include both […]

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Global payments platform Adyen and BNPL platform Affirm have extended their partnership into the U.K., a move designed to help British merchants offer consumers more flexible payment options.

Under the expanded collaboration, Adyen’s merchant customers in the U.K. can now integrate Affirm’s installment payment services directly into their checkout systems. Affirm’s payment plans include both interest-free and interest-bearing options, allowing approved customers to select terms best aligned with their budgets.

“Adyen customers all over the globe are demanding best-in-class payment experiences to boost business and drive customer engagement, which is why we are expanding our partnership with Affirm into the U.K.,” said Nicole Olbe, Managing Director for Adyen in the U.K.

The partnership builds on proven success in North America, where Adyen merchants offering Affirm saw significant growth. Annual transaction volumes through the partnership have increased more than sevenfold from 2021 to 2023.

Ruth Spratt, Vice President and U.K. Country Manager at Affirm, highlighted the mutual benefits of the extended relationship, stating that British merchants can now leverage Affirm’s consumer-centric financing solutions to drive customer engagement and business expansion.

The partnership between the two companies began in November 2020, initially enabling Affirm payments for Adyen’s U.S. merchants across digital and physical channels. In December 2024, Adyen extended Affirm’s offerings to its platform customers in the U.S. and Canada, and the service became broadly available to Canadian merchants. Affirm formally launched its services in the U.K. in November 2024 under regulation by the Financial Conduct Authority.

U.K. merchants using Adyen can immediately access Affirm’s installment payment solutions to support business growth and consumer spending flexibility.

The recent PYMNTS Intelligence report “How People Pay: Cash-Short Consumers Drive BNPL Usage” found that consumers facing cash flow shortages are turning to alternative credit options like BNPL at a much higher rate than other consumers.

“BNPL is bridging the gap for cash-strapped consumers. Consumers with cash flow shortages are 3.5 times more likely to use BNPL than consumers who are financially stable,” PYMNTS wrote Monday (Dec. 16). “Meanwhile, 8.9% of consumers who frequently experience cash flow shortages used BNPL in the past 30 days, compared to just 2.5% of financially stable consumers. BNPL is more accessible than traditional credit, allowing consumers to manage their financial demands without the restrictions of conventional credit.”

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