{"id":350649,"date":"2025-12-17T08:02:14","date_gmt":"2025-12-17T08:02:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/350649\/"},"modified":"2025-12-17T08:02:14","modified_gmt":"2025-12-17T08:02:14","slug":"buy-now-pay-later-plans-may-seem-attractive-but-come-at-a-cost-warn-experts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/350649\/","title":{"rendered":"Buy now, pay later plans may seem attractive but come at a cost, warn experts"},"content":{"rendered":"

\t\t\tDescrease article font size<\/p>\n

\t\t\tIncrease article font size<\/p>\n

Buy now, pay later.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

For many people it\u2019s an attractive idea at this time of year, with so much holiday spending taking place.<\/p>\n

Such plans, which break the cost of a larger purchase into smaller, seemingly more manageable payments, are becoming a lot more common for consumers.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\"Click<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t2:06
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tExperts warn of dangers of buy now, pay later options\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

But experts warn that they come with a risk \u2014 especially if you\u2019re trying to control your spending.<\/p>\n

Story continues below advertisement<\/p>\n

\u201cThere can only be so much of a shift when it\u2019s the basic goods that we need, our food, our housing. When those prices have increased, there\u2019s only so much give in the budget,\u201d said Alex Bierman, a sociology professor at the University of Calgary.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\"Get<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tGet weekly money news<\/p>\n

Get expert insights, Q&A on markets, housing, inflation, and personal finance information delivered to you every Saturday.<\/p>\n

\u201cPeople generally spend more when using the buy now, pay later options than if they didn\u2019t have those options,\u201d said Bierman. \u201cSo, there\u2019s a real risk that people essentially end up overspending even beyond the interest they may pay.\u201d<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tUniversity of Calgary sociology professor, Alex Bierman says many people are still struggling with the effects of inflation, especially people at lower income levels, so the idea of buy now, pay later can appear to be an attractive option.\t\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tGlobal News\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

The Credit Counselling Society says more and more Canadians are contacting them for help as inflation continues to shrink family budgets.<\/p>\n

In November there was an 11-per cent spike compared to the same month last year.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tFinancial education Mark Kalinowski says younger consumers are especially drawn to the idea of buy now, pay later but he warns the happiness it can provide is just temporary.\t\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tGlobal News\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

\u201cThe problem is people build up a lot of little payments that are due every month or every quarter and over time it erodes all their cashflow,\u201d said Mark Kalinowski.<\/p>\n

Story continues below advertisement<\/p>\n

His advice is to take some extra time to think about your purchase.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you need to buy now pay later, you probably don\u2019t need to buy now,\u201d said Kalinowski.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\"Click<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t2:24
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tBuy now, pay later: A help or a hindrance?\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

\n\t\t&copy 2025 Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc.\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Descrease article font size Increase article font size Buy now, pay later. For many people it\u2019s an attractive…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":350650,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[45,152366,49,48,53511,46,134],"class_list":["post-350649","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-economy","tag-business","tag-buy-now-pay-later","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-consumer-debt","tag-economy","tag-money"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/350649","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=350649"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/350649\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/350650"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=350649"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=350649"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=350649"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}