Section 75 on a buy-now-pay-later plan, assessed

The most consequential sentence the regulator has published about buy-now-pay-later this month is not about affordability checks. It sits near the bottom of a consumer page, under a heading about refunds, and says Section 75 of the Consumer Credit Act is available where deferred payment credit is regulated — which the FCA calls “the same protection you’d have if you used a credit card”.

That is a large claim stated briefly. This desk assesses redress routes rather than products, so we take it at face value, date it, and ask the question that matters: when does it reach a shopper, and when does it quietly not?

What is on the record

The regulator's published position, as of its 06/08/2026 update

The statement	Section 75 of the Consumer Credit Act is available on regulated DPC
Where it appears	The FCA's Buy Now Pay Later consumer page, last updated 06/08/2026
What DPC means there	Interest-free credit, 12 or fewer instalments, repayable over 12 months or less
Regulated when	The lender and the supplier of the goods or services are different businesses
Not regulated when	The same business provides both the goods and the credit
Also outside	Any DPC agreement taken out before 15 July 2026
Complaint order	The lender first, then the Financial Ombudsman Service if unsatisfied

Every line above is the FCA’s own, and the date stamp matters: this is a new perimeter, and a page last updated on 6 August 2026 may be updated again.

Why the route is worth having

It is a claim against the lender, not only the retailer. That is the point of Section 75, and why it is worth more than a refund policy: it is most valuable exactly where a refund policy is worth nothing, because the retailer has gone under.

It attaches to a product people do not think of as credit. Deferred payment credit is presented at checkout as a payment method, and that framing has always cost consumers protections. Here it works the other way: the plan carries a statutory route the shopper did not know they were acquiring.

The escalation behind it is free. If the lender rejects a claim, the complaint route we assessed after regulation is open, at no cost to the consumer.

Where it stops

The retailer-as-lender carve-out is invisible at the point of sale. The FCA is explicit that where the same business supplies both the goods and the credit, the agreement is not regulated. Nothing at a checkout tells a shopper which arrangement they are being offered.

Nothing reaches back before 15 July 2026. The FCA states that agreements taken out before that date remain unregulated and the new protections do not apply. A plan opened in June 2026 and still being repaid sits outside, and that boundary is doing a great deal of quiet work.

The sentence is hedged, and correctly so. The regulator says a refund may be available, not that it will be.

We are not restating the section’s conditions. We could not open the current text of the section for this piece, and this desk does not summarise statute it has not read line by line — so read section 75 of the Consumer Credit Act 1974 yourself, or take the free MoneyHelper guidance the FCA links from the same page.

Awareness is doing none of the work. A protection announced in one sentence under a “Refunds” heading, on a consumer page most shoppers will never open, is not one the market has absorbed.

Making a claim, in order

Establish the date first: an agreement entered into before 15 July 2026 is, per the FCA, outside the new perimeter.

Then establish who lent you the money. If the credit came from the business that sold you the goods, the FCA’s position is that the agreement is not regulated. A separate lender is necessary but not sufficient: the FCA’s guidance describes regulated deferred payment credit as interest-free, repayable in 12 or fewer instalments over 12 months or less, and lent by a different business from the supplier. Whether a particular plan meets all of that is a question for the lender, not for us.

Then put it to the lender rather than the retailer, and name Section 75 rather than simply asking for a refund, so it is clear which route you are invoking. If the answer is unsatisfactory, the ombudsman route is next and costs nothing.

What we will not do is tell you Section 75 applies to your plan. That turns on the agreement’s date, its structure, and conditions in the Act itself.

Pros and cons

The honest ledger

Pros

A claim against the lender, which is worth most exactly when the retailer has failed
The regulator states the position plainly and dates the statement
Free escalation behind it: the lender first, then the ombudsman
Anchored to credit-card protection, a comparison ordinary shoppers already understand

Cons

Switched off where the retailer is also the lender — an arrangement invisible at checkout
Reaches nothing entered into before 15 July 2026, per the FCA's own page
Rests on one hedged sentence of consumer guidance, not a rule a shopper can cite to a lender
The section's own statutory conditions are absent from the page where consumers are told the protection exists
Nothing at the point of sale signals whether the plan being offered is the regulated kind

Verdict

Our assessment is that the protection is real and the disclosure of it thin. The FCA has done the substantive part — stated the position, dated it, named the escalation route. What is missing sits with lenders: a shopper is not told whether the plan they are accepting is the regulated kind, and that single fact decides whether any of this reaches them.

Before assuming the protection covers you, check your agreement’s date and who lent you the money. Fin Watch is a publisher rather than an authorised firm, is not regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority, and offers no financial advice; check any lender’s status on the FCA Register yourself. And the point that outlives every rule change: an instalment plan is credit, whatever the checkout calls it.