Welcome Finance - Repayment Terms

BeInTheKnow

Hi There,

I got out a Welcome Finance loan to pay a deposit on my first house (renting) back in august last year. I lent £1000 over 36 months at £59 a month.

On checking my credit report it states £1000 over 37 months. Would this mean it will be for 37 payments? Or just a simple error? I would have thought if it was for 36 months it would say just that!

They also phoned me up the other day to change my DD date from the 1st of every month to the last working day of every month. Apparently it is company policy to set DD dates to pay days.

Is this to try to con more money out of me or am i just paranoid?

Regshoe

First point - there could just be an error on the report, have you missed a payment though? If you have this might explain the stretching to 37 months. If you signed a 36 month contract then it should be paid back over 36 months (albeit that will be something like 37 months from when you actually received the cash as you don't make the first payment straight away, at least you shouldn't). Maybe somebody with more knowledge of credit reports can help here.

Second point (which I know more about). It is company policy to set your payment date to be at the same point as your pay day (makes sense from their point of view and probably from yours too). However you should watch out that they don't take two payments in the same month, as this is possibly what they are angling for (remember they will be on a bonus for collecting as much cash as possible - so they have every incentive to get more money from you). That said if you can afford to make two payments this month then you may be best to just let it go through - you will get ahead by a month, pay the loan off slightly earlier and save some interest charges, it would also mean that if you missed a payment further down the line you wouldn't be in arrears.

Sol00

This isn't an error, Welcome have been doing this on many of their customers' accounts, hence the trouble they're currently in.

Contact WFS and ask them to correct it immediately and I would also contact the ICO as this is well known.