Great Universal BNPL - Extra charges??

livingdeadgirl

Hi all,

Pretty new to the board (this is my first post), so apologies if this is in the wrong section.

I need some help, advice or either an explanation in layman's terms of what exactly is happening with this Great Universal offer. I'll try as best I can to explain this situation without (hopefully) confusing too many people.

My Mum is a Great Universal agent and I am her customer wanting to order a corner sofa. The corner sofa is priced in the catalogue and their website at £679.00. This is not a bargain price or on a sale. Now, Mum mentioned to me that Great Universal are offering a Buy Now Pay Later (March 2011) on their website. Great, I can order it now and start paying for it next year!

However, once on the website when adding the sofa to your shopping basket, paying over 104 weeks at £8.47 per week (29.9%APR) the total price for the sofa is £880.87. BUT once you add their BNPL code at the checkout, the payment terms jumps to 104 weeks at £11.23 (29.9%) and works out in total the amount to be paid is £1,167.51.

I asked my Mum to call them directly to explain the massive difference in price and the woman that she spoke to tried explaining as best she could (Mum said she sounded like she didn't have a clue) and then hung up on her.

Now is there someone out there who could explain this, just so when I call them I am armed with information.

I hope I haven't confused anyone too much.

Thanks for reading,

Emma

mumOf2wonderfulkids

just going on what happens with my catologue with BNPL,

sofa is £800, if i wanted to spread payments monthly it would work out with interest at say £1200.00

i buy on buy now, pay sept 2011 - pay the whole £800 before aug 2011 - no interest occured
i buy on buy now pay sept 2011 - only manage to pay off £400 by sept - the whole years interest gets added on so i would still be left to pay £800 (interest and remaining for sofa)

prices i have used are completely guesses, but the jist of it is if you manage to pay off the whole sofa amount before the bnpl month you dont pay any interest, but if you dont you get the whole years interest added on,

hope this helps

livingdeadgirl

Thanks for that,

I guess I just wanted to know how they can justify a massive jump in price, when you're paying for the sofa over the same amount of weeks. Surely this then defeats the whole object of BNPL when the sofa without the BNPL code over the longest terms of weeks, 156, the total price is £989.86. It's the same amount of APR, I just don't get it. :think:

custardy

i believe its them working out the full price over the full period of credit
i think you can pay the amount off before the BNPL comes into effect and pay no interest?
so could pay into your account over the BNPL period?

mumOf2wonderfulkids

oh yeah, i see what your saying now, can i just ask what the name of the sofa is?

just looked at some of them and it says that they are 104 weeks interest free ( i'm probably looking at the wrong ones!)

mumOf2wonderfulkids

livingdeadgirl wrote: »

However, once on the website when adding the sofa to your shopping basket, paying over 104 weeks at £8.47 per week (29.9%APR) the total price for the sofa is £880.87. BUT once you add their BNPL code at the checkout, the payment terms jumps to 104 weeks at £11.23 (29.9%) and works out in total the amount to be paid is £1,167.51.

i think what the op is trying to say is that one option (without bnpl) is 104 weeks at 29.9apr is a total of £880.87
but exactly same weeks (104) and apr(29.9) when using bnpl it jumps up to £1167.51

livingdeadgirl

mumOf2wonderfulkids wrote: »

oh yeah, i see what your saying now, can i just ask what the name of the sofa is?

just looked at some of them and it says that they are 104 weeks interest free ( i'm probably looking at the wrong ones!)

It's the McCord Cressida sofa.
I'm glad someone else is kinda understanding where I'm coming from. I was starting to think I was going completely nuts!

livingdeadgirl

custardy wrote: »

i believe its them working out the full price over the full period of credit
i think you can pay the amount off before the BNPL comes into effect and pay no interest?
so could pay into your account over the BNPL period?

But surely the period of credit does not start until March 2011?
I think it might be safe to say that the BNPL is not a good idea and that I would be better off just getting it over the normal terms. At least then I'm not paying almost double for it.

mumOf2wonderfulkids

does anyone you know have very catologue? its only 549 in there
http://www.very.co.uk/rf/vry/s.do?Ntx=mode+matchallpartial&Nu=this_product&Np=1&Nty=1&Ntk=generic_search&Ntt=McCord%20Cressida%20sofa


i can see where the original says 880 but i cant get to checkout to put in the code to see what happens.

livingdeadgirl

mumOf2wonderfulkids wrote: »

does anyone you know have very catologue? its only 549 in there


No, unfortunately I don't and I am unable to gain credit. So Very is not an option.

mumOf2wonderfulkids

livingdeadgirl wrote: »

mumOf2wonderfulkids wrote: »

does anyone you know have very catologue? its only 549 in there


No, unfortunately I don't and I am unable to gain credit. So Very is not an option.

that's a shame, can your mum not open a very account? most of the things in great uni are exactly the same in very and its alot cheaper too, if i remember right they are owned by the same group anyway, the bnpl code for great uni is exactly the same for very too

(gosh i sound like a right tight @rse lol)