Live data from Hacker News

Microsoft pushes ahead with controversial ‘buy now, pay later’ feature for Edge

portswigger.net

121–130 of 307 posts

Re: Microsoft pushes ahead with controversial ‘buy now, pay later’ feature for Edge

#121

> It allows any purchase between $35 and $1,000 made through Microsoft Edge to be split into four payments over a six-week period. > While the service is being promoted as ‘interest-free’, some were quick to point out that all transactions are subject to a “$4 flat fee”. $4 in fees on $1000 over 6 weeks is an effective APR of around 4% - pretty good. $4 in fees on $35 over 6 weeks is an outrageous APR of around 123%.…

Now web browsers are gonna become credit cards attached to your browsing history... Great job guys! :| Ugh, who ever would have thought 2021 would have come to this.

anyone paying attention.?

Re: Microsoft pushes ahead with controversial ‘buy now, pay later’ feature for Edge

#123

I cannot stand how everything with internet access is just becoming a vehicle to shove ads down everyone’s throat. This web browser wants to sell me credit deals. My expensive TV has banner ads in the menus (well, it did until I blocked about two dozen domains). An increasing amount of apps are sending “offers” I never requested via push notifications on my phone. My belongings are not a fucking corporate billboard.

I typically respect Apple products, but they also shove ads in the settings app...

Re: Microsoft pushes ahead with controversial ‘buy now, pay later’ feature for Edge

#124

Microsoft finally made a browser which renders websites as expected, is up-to-date regarding security and features, and (most) people actually don't have the need to replace it with anything else. I will never understand why they NEED to ruin this. It's baffling.

As long as economics 101 is: "Hello capitalism!" ... What do you expect?

Re: Microsoft pushes ahead with controversial ‘buy now, pay later’ feature for Edge

#126
I recently got me a windows laptop for media consumption purposes (I still have my Mac mini for primary work). The very first thing I noticed was the constant push for edge browser everywhere. Even on the Lock Screen of Windows, I saw 3 places asking to try Edge browser.

Had to go to settings and disable the ads for edge:

https://www.groovypost.com/howto/turn-off-windows-10-lock-sc...

Re: Microsoft pushes ahead with controversial ‘buy now, pay later’ feature for Edge

#128

> It allows any purchase between $35 and $1,000 made through Microsoft Edge to be split into four payments over a six-week period. > While the service is being promoted as ‘interest-free’, some were quick to point out that all transactions are subject to a “$4 flat fee”. $4 in fees on $1000 over 6 weeks is an effective APR of around 4% - pretty good. $4 in fees on $35 over 6 weeks is an outrageous APR of around 123%.…

Now web browsers are gonna become credit cards attached to your browsing history... Great job guys! :| Ugh, who ever would have thought 2021 would have come to this.

>> Now web browsers are gonna become credit cards attached to your browsing history... Great job guys! :|

The dark humor is that some of the developers responsible for today's horrible web experience are here on HN...

Re: Microsoft pushes ahead with controversial ‘buy now, pay later’ feature for Edge

#129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would applaud the convenience, but the terms are not nearly as useful as other services. If I can spread a purchase over four months, that's really useful. Affirm has been good to me this year. ...But what is even the point when you bill twice as often as most people get paychecks?

> what is even the point when you bill twice as often as most people get paychecks? I'm seeing some employers here offering "next day pay" i.e. you get paid today for the hours you worked yesterday. IDK but could also imagine that many "gig" jobs work that way, i.e. do Uber drivers get their pay immediately with each ride provided, or two weeks later? Wonder if that model will soon be more common?

So on further thought, four payments over six weeks, assuming an immediate initial payment, means it bills every two weeks, or every standard paycheck. So I guess it's mostly fine...

But Affirm still defaults to spreading over four months, usually interest free for the retailers they partner with, and ends up a far superior deal.

Re: Microsoft pushes ahead with controversial ‘buy now, pay later’ feature for Edge

#130
post #84

MS is probably one of the best positioned to give very accurate digital credit score, given just about everything goes thru their OS and browser. There’s tons of such companies now - basically just scraping your Uber, Postmates, etc accounts and selling that to banks so people without credit history can have a start.

I don’t get how scraping info from Uber and whatnot helps with borrowing money. How are those signals about your risk to the bank?

Shows that you work and earn income, apparently.
Post reply on HN