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0 pointsgscott4y ago0 comments

Affirm is not like a credit card. They actually put your loan with Cross River Bank and are just the middle-man who collects commissions and collects fees from merchants for advertising on Affirm.com/app. I learned this the hard way... they care not if you get the item, or if it is good, or if it is a scam. Affirm is oblivious to it all. Just collecting fees.

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crisopolis4y ago

Same with any other loan product the bank doesn't care if it's a scam, only cares about collecting that glorious interest payment or fees associated. Plenty of people buy bad used cars with loans that span over years and that used car may fail months after purchase. Guess who doesn't care... the loan provider/bank.

Still the point is Affirm was the wrong target for their chargeback and the OP should have contacted Affirm to potentially resolve the merchant not delivering the goods or a refund of the loan.

Merchant > Affirm > OP Bank

benatkin4y ago

Dental work is another, there are a lot of shady BNPL dental firms.

iancarroll4y ago

Cross River might originate your loan, but AFAIK this is basically just a workaround for regulation on loan origination. Affirm just buys the loans back from Cross River once they have been funded, so they bear the credit risk.

(It sounds like it’s more complex than this, but I doubt Cross River has significant exposure to Affirm loans.)

tomnipotent4y ago

Affirm makes money on both sides - interest from the customer, and a percentage of the transaction fee based inversely to the customer interest rate (e.g. you can do 0% interest but the retailer pays more per transaction).

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