(Bloomberg) -- Affirm Holdings Inc. will provide data on its pay-over-time loans to credit-reporting company Experian Plc, as the financial technology firm aims to abate industrywide concerns over a lack of transparency from short-term loan products.

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Experian will start receiving data — including buy now, pay later loans split into four payments and longer-term, monthly-installment loans — from Affirm starting April 1. Although the new loan reporting won’t initially be factored into consumers’ traditional credit scores, future scoring models could include the data, the two firms said in a statement Wednesday. The new data-sharing agreement will support lender decision-making via credit reports.

“The buy now, pay later industry must evolve from simply providing flexible payment options to helping consumers build their credit histories and better manage their finances,” Affirm President Libor Michalek said in the statement.

Providers of buy now, pay later products have historically shied away from sharing data with credit agencies, meaning lenders don’t have a complete picture of customers’ financial health. Affirm has faced past calls to share its data with third parties so they can more accurately assess household loan eligibility. Such data is used by entities from US regional lenders to multinational businesses and global central banks. This partnership follows in the steps of Apple Inc., which said it would share information with Experian, but then later abandoned its buy now, pay later product.

“This is the right thing to do for consumers, the industry and the economy at large,” Scott Brown, Experian’s group president of financial services for North America, said in the statement. “Our role as the first credit-reporting agency to establish this partnership with Affirm underscores our shared commitment to improve consumer financial health and foster more informed lending decisions.”

Klarna Group Plc, Block Inc.’s Afterpay and PayPal Holdings Inc., which also provide buy now, pay later products, don’t currently supply data about those offerings to credit-reporting firms.

As more pay-over-time providers report account information to Experian, lenders who request the firm’s credit reports will be able to see consumers’ payment history. Affirm said it also will work closely with other credit-reporting companies to provide data.

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--With assistance from Paige Smith.

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