Dordash and Klarna are joining strength to allow users to pay food deliveries with loan loans, calling it “essential to meet the needs of our customers.” Not everyone sees it like that.
The announcement has caused great criticism in social networks, less aimed at the companies themselves that questioning what you need to use a service “buy now, pay later” for food orders, says about the economy more and more full of debts.
“Come now, pay later? A credit apocalypse is approaching,” wrote an user X on Thursday when the association was announced.
Another X poster used a photo of a sad Dave Ramsey, the expert in personal finance, with the subtitle, “What do you mean that you have $ 11K in ‘Dordash Debt'”.
Others launched “sopranos” memes, joking about “Doradash debts collection out of their door because a Chipotle payment was lost.”
Economic commentator Kylan Scanlon said in a video of social networks that the agreement was another example of the “game economy.”
“We have memecoins, sports bets: we love a good vice in the United States and we can do it completely without friction,” he said. “We don’t even have to wear pants. Just give it to you and worry about everything else later.” He added that “there are real winners and losers” in business models that monetize not only the convenience but “impulsivity.”
Klarna, who is preparing for an initial public offer, is among BNPL suppliers that have become virtually every corner of the consumer economy since the pandemic, as after paying, affirming and sesez.
Slightly regulated financial services provide users with a variety of ways to pay purchases; Among the most popular are short -term loans that can generally be paid in several interestless installments. Companies earn money charging users for late payments and merchants or lost due to the ability to offer BNPL loans in payments.
Dordash said customers can use Klarna for many types of purchases on their platform, not only small -dollar food deliveries. They can pay in their entirety in advance, in four installments or later, “as a date that is aligned with their check schedules.”
A Klarna spokesman recognized online rejection, but said that any loan for food purchase is potentially worrying, depending on the circumstances.
“If people are in a situation where they feel they have to put their food on credit, it is a bad indicator for society,” said the spokesman.
Even so, many people make “a rational decision” to use BNPL services to help manage their money, said the spokesman, added that the new features would be available only for purchases of Dordash of at least $ 35, a few dollars more than the average order of the platform from the past spring. “Where high -cost credit cards are accepted, consumers must be able to choose a credit product of zero interest, instead.”
In fact, the data of the entire industry show that short -term loans have become a routine feature of the wallets of many consumers, particularly among young adults that face inflation and with the average interest rates of credit cards that are still about 20%.
The BNPL explosion coincides with the record levels of debt and growing consumer pessimism. The total debt of households exceeded $ 18 billion at the end of last year, according to the Bank of the Federal Reserve of New York, with credit card balances that include a $ 1.2 billion record of that sum. The feeling of the consumer fell this month to its lowest level since 2022, and the expectations of the borrowers of the missing debt payments in the next three months reached its highest level since 2020, the Fed of New York found.
A spokesman for Dordash did not comment on the criticisms of his association with Klarna, saying that his collaboration “provides even more flexibility, control and options.” The delivery service indicated that its users can already pay with Venmo and Cashapp, as well as the Government’s help, including Snap’s benefits. Klarna is now available on the Instant Ledible Delivery Platform, and recently replaced his AFFIRM rival as the exclusive BNPL partner of Walmart.
Much of the concern for BNPL has focused on the possible effects on the records of credit of the borrowers, which largely still does not reflect the use of services despite the years of discussions with the credit reports offices to change that. However, a study published last month for AFFIRM and the FICO credit annotation firm showed most consumers with five or more affirmation did not see a real inconvenience in their credit scores, some of which really increased. And consumers constantly qualify BNPL products favorably in surveys. Last year, 89% of the borrowers told Transunion that they were satisfied or very satisfied with the services.
But experts in personal finance and consumer defenders say that the repairs initiated by the Doordash-Klarna agreement reflect real financial risks.
“Making four payments to cover three tacos on Tuesday sounds complicated because it is,” said Adam Rust, director of Financial Services of the Federation of Consumers of America, a defense group. “I would not characterize this as a solution. It is a Fintech innovation that creates problems.”
Users could not only face the late Klarna rates, he said, but “once customers consent to pay with automatic debit, risk additional overwhelming rates” of their banks.
Rust also highlighted the recent work of the Consumer Financial Protection Office that remains in danger or has been completely arrested when the Trump Defense Administration of the Agency.
The CFPB recently granted BNPL clients more capacity to dispute charges and obtain reimbursements, but with ordered personnel to stop all compliance activity last month, former employees and defenders of consumers believe that the rule has been debatable. A commercial group that represents Fintech companies, including some BNPL lenders but not Klarna, asked the Trump administration this month for an exemption from a scheduled law to enter into force next week that requires certain lenders to verify the capacity of the borrowers to pay the loans before they are stopped.
Financial planners have long warned customers against budgetary strains of the excessive use of BNPL. Even some borrowers who have spent strongly with services have begun to warn others about their risks, saying that they facilitate that users with liquidity problems accumulate debts that are difficult to pay.
“Eat Now, Pay later is a horrible trap,” he wrote in X last week, he wrote in X last week, Bone Fide Wealth president, an advisory firm focused on millennials. “If you need to borrow to give you a burrito, you are the product. Nothing more.”
