YCD News – On November 2, AmazonBusiness announced that it would begin rolling out Affirm buy now, pay later service for eligible sole proprietors, the first buy now, pay later option introduced to Amazon’s B2B business. During the same period, Walmart also announced the launch of its buy now, pay later service powered by Klarna on its Canadian website and app.
Amazon will reportedly offer the buy now, pay later payment option to all eligible sole proprietor customers before Black Friday. The partnership marks the debut of Affirm’s B2B installment payment option for sole proprietors.
After a customer selects “Affirm” at AmazonBusiness checkout and enters a few pieces of information, the small business owner will receive an instant credit decision and, if approved, can choose to pay in installments from 3 to 48 months. For example, a $200 purchase at 15 percent APR will cost the customer $34.81 over six months, totaling $208.84.
Amazon initially partnered with Affirm in August 2021 to allow select customers to pay for orders of $50 or more in installments.Affirm expanded to Amazon Canada’s website in 2022 and was first integrated as a payment option on AmazonPay earlier this year.
Recently, Walmart Canada also announced that it will allow customers to choose the interest-free, Klarna-powered “buy now, pay later” (BNPL) payment option, which will be available to customers when they visit Walmart.ca and shop with Walmart Canada.
The fact that the two giants are simultaneously ramping up BNPL payments indicates to some extent that consumer demand for installment payments is on the rise, and also reflects the fact that competition will be even fiercer during this year’s peak season.
Walmart revealed that the launch of BNPL payments comes at a time when demand for BNPL is growing rapidly among Canadian consumers, with preferences shifting to flexible, more valuable payment options. BNPL payments in Canada are reportedly growing 51.6% annually and are expected to reach $2.13 billion by the end of 2023.