- Affirm has extended its partnership with Walmart to offer buy now, pay later (BNPL) tools at self-checkout stands.
- Shoppers can use Affirm to pay for non-grocery purchases ranging from $144 to $4,000 in monthly installments.
- Affirm also recently landed partnerships with Amazon and Google.
BNPL heavyweight Affirm ended 2023 announcing an expansion of a partnership with one of its major customers. The California-based company announced that Walmart will use its buy now, pay later (BNPL) technology at select self-checkout locations.
Reuters reported late last year that more than 4,500 Walmart stores in the U.S. will offer Affirm’s BNPL as an option to shoppers whose non-grocery purchases range between $144 to $4,000. Consumers will have the option to pay back their purchases in monthly installments spanning three months to 24 months.
To keep things simple at the point-of-sale kiosks, the BNPL onboarding process will take place on the user’s phone. Shoppers that opt to use BNPL to pay for their purchase will need to use their phone to log into Affirm’s mobile app or website and enter credentials, including the last four digits of their social security number. Once Affirm approves the customer, they will receive a barcode on their phone that they scan at the physical self-checkout register to complete the sale.
Walmart, which ended its layaway program in 2020, has offered Affirm’s BNPL technology to U.S. shoppers since 2019 at in-person checkout locations. Expanding the alternative payment option to the self-checkout and moving the onboarding process to the customer’s own mobile device reduces the friction that may occur when shoppers onboard to BNPL with the help of a cashier. This may result in an increased use of Affirm’s BNPL at Walmart’s point-of-sale.
The expansion of its collaboration with Walmart is the latest in a string of major partnerships for Affirm. Amazon tapped Affirm for Amazon Pay option in June of last year, and five months later, the ecommerce giant launched Affirm’s BNPL as a payment option for small businesses. Additionally, last month, Google announced it is using Affirm and its competitor Zip to provide BNPL options for shoppers using Google Pay.
Affirm is one of a handful of Walmart’s existing financial services partners. The retailer is also teamed up with Capital One, which offers a rewards credit card; Western Union, Ria, and MoneyGram for money transfer services; and Green Dot for its prepaid card. Interestingly, Walmart has been in the process of building its own neobank, One, since 2022, and many of One’s offerings compete with those of Walmart’s current partners.
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