Walmart Introduces Affirm’s ‘Buy Now, Pay Later’ At Self-Checkout Lanes

Walmart is expanding its new partnership with installment payment service Affirm. According to Retail Dive, the two companies partnered in 2019 to introduce Affirm’s installment payment options to Walmart’s 4,000 U.S. Supercenters. Affirm’s buy now, pay later service has become very popular in recent years and is now an available option for major companies like Amazon, Target, and more. For Amazon customers, orders must exceed $50, whereas Target shoppers must spend more than $100.

Pat Suh, Affirm’s senior vice president of revenue, said in a statement, “Recent Affirm research revealed that more than half of Americans (54%) are looking for retailers to offer a buy now, pay later option at checkout. Moreover, we’ve found that 76% of consumers would either delay or not make a purchase without Affirm. Expanding our partnership with Walmart and bringing Affirm’s transparent monthly pay-over-time options to their self-checkout kiosks in the U.S. will help even more consumers increase their purchasing power during the holiday shopping season and beyond.”

Affirm aims to continue its expansion into the retail space. During a webcast with Bank of America Equity Research analyst Jason Kupferberg, Affirm CFO Michael Linford highlighted the company’s Affirm Debit+ card as part of its goal to increase brick-and-mortar sales. 

“As an industry, I don’t think anybody has really solved [the physical store] problem with great success,” Linford said during the webcast.

Affirm is one of several installment payment services helping to reshape the retail market space. According to data from Bank of America Securities, Afterpay, a competing provider, increased its number of U.S. active monthly users to 4.2 million, while others like Klarna (3.3 million) and Zip (755,000) follow behind. Affirm (also 3.3. Million customers) is neck and neck with Klarna in second place.

To take advantage of Walmart’s buy now, pay later option, you need to apply online at Affirm.com/Walmart before making a purchase. After approval, submit your purchase total to the website, which will provide a scannable barcode. Show the barcode at checkout to pay the first installment.