FICO to incorporate buy-now-pay-later loans into credit scores

[mathematic]

5. No, you've got it right. BNPL are essentially credit cards in practice.

BNPL products are a newly widespread credit product that compete as an alternative to credit cards. You use a BNPL product to buy anything you'd buy with a credit card, as long as the merchant accepts it. Like credit cards, and unlike mortgages or car loans, they're unsecured. Like mortgage or car loans but unlike credit cards, they set a fixed repayment term. Like all these loans, they can be paid off in full at any time.

They are a different category of credit than the other loans you've mentioned and will now be factored into credit scores according to this news story. I would have guessed they already were included but apparently they hadn't gotten around to it until now. For BNPL to affect your credit score two things have to happen, the BNPL lender needs to report your payments to a credit bureau and that credit bureau needs to incorporate that information into their credit scoring models.