Consumer Federation of America joined 78 additional consumer, housing, civil rights, legal services, faith, community, small business, student borrower, and public interest organizations in comments to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) regarding their Inquiry Into Buy-Now-Pay-Later (BNPL) Providers. The groups welcomed the CFPB’s recent inquiry into Affirm, Afterpay, Klarna, PayPal, and Zip, however remain alarmed by the lack of regulation of this exploding consumer credit product market. The groups urged the CFPB to view BNPL products as credit cards covered by the Truth in Lending Act (TILA), to enact a larger participant rule to supervise this market, and to look out for practices that harm consumers.
Consumer Federation of America, the National Consumer Law Center (on behalf of its low income clients), Center for Responsible Lending also submitted a longer, more detailed comment.