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Initiative Details Pilot Study: Buy Now, Pay Later Services in Canada

The Pilot Study: Buy Now, Pay Later Services in Canada is a survey from the Financial Consumer Agency of Canada. It aimed to broaden the Agency's understanding of the buy now, pay later market in Canada, from the perspective of Canadian consumers.

Initiative type

  • Survey

Demographics collected

  • Age
  • Education
  • Ethno-cultural group
  • Financially responsible for dependent
  • First language
  • Gender
  • Household income
  • Immigration status
  • Marital status
  • Place of birth
  • Province/territory of residence
  • Status or non-status indigenous person
  • Visible minority
  • Work situation
  • Year of landing (if born outside of Canada)

Target population

  • General public

Adopter

Link

Related priorities

This initiative relates to the following National Financial Literacy Strategy priorities and target outcomes: 

Priority 1

Communicate in ways people understand

  • Target outcome 1.1

Priority 6

Strengthen consumer protection measures

  • Target outcome 6.1
Related headlines
Headline

Canadians want to understand how the actions they take or the services they use might impact their credit score.

Financial institutions use credit scores to decide whether to lend a consumer money. Credit bureaus and lenders often do not share the formulas they use to calculate credit scores. For this reason, it is difficult to know the impact actions can have on credit scores.

The analysis is based on research and the findings supplied by the adopters of the National Financial Literacy Strategy Measurement Plan. The related findings can be found at the bottom of this page.

Source: Pilot Study: Buy Now, Pay Later Services in Canada, Survey of Canadians' Use of Banking Products and Services
Headline

Many Buy-Now-Pay-Later users don’t understand all aspects of the service.

Buy-Now-Pay-Later services allow people to pay off purchases in instalments, but it’s not always clear how they work. This lack of understanding could lead to unexpected fees or financial difficulties for users.

The analysis is based on research and the findings supplied by the adopters of the National Financial Literacy Strategy Measurement Plan. The related findings can be found at the bottom of this page.

Source: Pilot Study: Buy Now, Pay Later Services in Canada
Related findings
Finding

Fewer than 10% of Canadians reported using a Buy-Now-Pay-Later service during 2021. Among them, about 10% found it difficult to understand the total cost of the service.

Initiative: Pilot Study: Buy Now, Pay Later Services in Canada

Adopter: Financial Consumer Agency of Canada
Finding

Fewer than 10% of Canadians reported using a Buy-Now-Pay-Later service during 2021. Among them, about 10% found it difficult to understand their payment schedule.

Initiative: Pilot Study: Buy Now, Pay Later Services in Canada

Adopter: Financial Consumer Agency of Canada
Finding

Fewer than 10% of Canadians reported using a Buy-Now-Pay-Later service during 2021. Among them, about 20% found it difficult to understand the penalties or interest charges for missed or partial payments.

Initiative: Pilot Study: Buy Now, Pay Later Services in Canada

Adopter: Financial Consumer Agency of Canada
Finding

Fewer than 10% of Canadians reported using a Buy-Now-Pay-Later service during 2021. Among them, about 35% found it difficult to understand how to resolve a potential dispute.

Initiative: Pilot Study: Buy Now, Pay Later Services in Canada

Adopter: Financial Consumer Agency of Canada
Finding

Fewer than 10% of Canadians reported using a Buy-Now-Pay-Later service during 2021. Among them, about 45% found it difficult to understand the impact of using the service on their credit score.

Initiative: Pilot Study: Buy Now, Pay Later Services in Canada

Adopter: Financial Consumer Agency of Canada
Finding

Fewer than 10% of Canadians reported using a Buy-Now-Pay-Later service during 2021. Among them, few made a complaint or tried to resolve a dispute with a financial service provider, or reported their experience of the dispute-resolution process.

Initiative: Pilot Study: Buy Now, Pay Later Services in Canada

Adopter: Financial Consumer Agency of Canada
Finding

Fewer than 10% of Canadians reported using a Buy-Now-Pay-Later service during 2021. Among them, most used credit card, linked bank account, or online bill payment to make scheduled payments. However, about 10% found it difficult to understand how their payments would be made.

Initiative: Pilot Study: Buy Now, Pay Later Services in Canada

Adopter: Financial Consumer Agency of Canada
Finding

Fewer than 10% of Canadians reported using a Buy-Now-Pay-Later service during 2021. Most of them understood the amount of each scheduled payment.

Initiative: Pilot Study: Buy Now, Pay Later Services in Canada

Adopter: Financial Consumer Agency of Canada
Related measures
Use the Opens in new tabMeasures Library to search for Strategy-Aligned Measures (SAMs) that help stakeholders in the financial ecosystem track progress toward achieving the National Strategy’s target outcomes.

The Financial Consumer Agency of Canada does not endorse, directly or indirectly, any adopters of the Measurement Plan, nor does it make any representations or warranties, express or implied, concerning the adopters' products or services or their fitness for a particular purpose.

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