- With ‘Pay Now’ consumers in the UK can pay immediately and in full wherever Klarna is available.
- Part of a package of consumer-focussed changes to drive up standards across the UK payments industry.
- Even stronger credit and affordability checks, clear checkout language, simplified T&Cs, improved complaints handling and removal of last remaining late fees.
London – 18th October 2021 – Klarna, the leading global retail bank, payments and shopping service, today announces a package of changes to expand and strengthen its UK offering to give consumers more choice, clarity and control over how they pay. ‘Pay Now’ ensures UK consumers can always pay immediately and in full, wherever Klarna is available, with the same payment experience whether they choose to pay now or later. And in its continued drive to set standards for the UK payments industry, Klarna is also strengthening affordability checks and checkout language, providing more ways for consumers to challenge complaints decisions on the rare occasions this becomes necessary, and removing the last remaining late fees on its regulated financing product – all with immediate effect.
Putting consumers in control whether they pay now or pay later
While it is best known for Buy Now Pay Later (BNPL) in the UK, globally Klarna offers a wide range of payment and shopping services and its ‘Pay Now’ immediate payment option is extremely popular globally. Klarna’s UK payment and shopping options will now be consistent with those offered globally across 20 markets, giving consumers more choice, clarity and control over how they pay.
Pay Now is launched alongside a package of consumer-focussed changes to drive up standards across the UK consumer payments industry. Central to this, Klarna has begun to leverage its own well established Open Banking services, already connected to over 6,000 banks across 20 countries, to help support even better real-time lending decisions. In addition to the robust checks which Klarna performs on each and every purchase, consumers will be able to securely share income and spending data from their bank accounts to confirm they can afford future repayments. This supports Klarna’s commitment to financial inclusion by giving safe access to credit for those individuals with a limited conventional credit history, which is reliant on the use of traditional credit and does not reflect how people are choosing to make payments today. Klarna continues to drive innovation and change with the UK Credit Reference Agencies to enable all buy now pay later providers to share their data. When completed this work will reward the vast majority of Klarna customers who use BNPL responsibly with improved credit scores, and further protect consumers from accumulating debt.
