Trying to pay of a Cahoot/Santander loan

briansmoke

Hi. This is my first post. Please be gentle.

I have a loan balance of about £850 with Santander at 20% interest. This was taken out years ago as a Cahoot flexible loan. I have been paying £50 monthly since I took out the loan several years ago.

I had the option to make overpayments or repay by credit cards with Cahoot . Santander had withdrawn this option. Over the past couple of years, I have missed a couple of payments, and I have always made an immediate payment to their collections team by debit/credit card.

I'm trying to get my finances in order having paid off my other personal loan recently. I have taken out a Bank Of Scotland mastercard with 13 months interest on balance transfers and purchases. My intention is to repay the Santander loan, and pay it off in full over the next year interest free.

I called Santander this week to pay last month's £50 which was in arrears. I asked if I could pay the remaining balance in full at the same time. I was told that they can only take card payments for arrears, and not to clear a balance. This is their policy. They will only take a cash payment at a branch, or a bank transfer, or a cheque. I can't raise a cheque on the credit card without incurring full interest.

I have now raised this as a complaint, and it will be looked into. I have explained the situation, and that I want to clear this debt. I have asked them to look into this with the intention of accepting payment by credit card even as a one off. I have also told them that I am willing to pay their costs for processing a credit card transaction.

They have pretty much stonewalled me, telling me that it is unlikely that they will accept this. I will have to wait and see. They have also said that the financial services ombudsman has no powers to make them accept a credit card payment in this circumstance.

I did ask the guy at Santander whether his company is a responsible lender. He said "absolutely". It seems to me that though that Santander has taken on Cahoot debts, and filed them under "high interest - withdrawn features". I would also note that Santander have written to me in the past saying that they weren't sure that they'd collected all the monthly payments, they couldn't tell me when or for how much, but they assured me that I wouldn't be adversely affected by this. I asked him to add this to the complaint. I don't think he did though, he seemed to want to get on with his day, and not spend any longer speaking to me.

I told him that when the complaints team contact me again, I will make an immediate payment on the spot. I got the impression though, that I shouldn't hold out much hope of this being an option.

I'm trying to do what's right, and I will take it to the ombudsman if I have to. I also am going to request copies of all payments made, recordings of conversations I have had with them, and copies of all their notes regarding my calls. I know that I have a right to this information under the data protection act, but it will probably cost me £10.

It might be easier for them to just let me pay the loan off. Perhaps they'll let me pay the £10 fee by credit card.

I will update this when I hear from them.

opinions4u

They don't have to accept credit card payments. Not many loan companies do accept payment by credit card.

Do the shopping on your credit card. Fill up with petrol on your credit card. Use the cash not spent to make a repayment at a Santander counter.

Stop messing about with complaints. You won't win because they don't have to run their business like you want them to.

Devils-Advocate_3

opinions4u wrote: »

They don't have to accept credit card payments. Not many loan companies do accept payment by credit card.

Do the shopping on your credit card. Fill up with petrol on your credit card. Use the cash not spent to make a repayment at a Santander counter.

Stop messing about with complaints. You won't win because they don't have to run their business like you want them to.

This is spot on. Sorry this isn't what you wanted to hear, but there's no point in telling you an untruth, OP. It's not very common for companies to allow loans to be repaid by credit cards. Credit repaying credit in this way is not usual, and is not permitted by lots of companies. The ombudsman can do nothing about this so it would be a complete waste of everyone's time for you to even bother going there.

As has been said, pay by credit card for everything you'd normally pay for with debit card/cash, and use the debit card to pay off your loan.

kazzywoo_2

We are currently having the same problem, and are just going to wait till they put in it into the hands of debt collectors then pay them by credit card, not sure whether this will be successful.

briansmoke

I missed my direct debit payment again this month. I had a letter the following day telling me that the previous month was still outstanding.

I had previously paid May's arrears in full by credit card.

I phoned them up, and after I gave them the account number, they asked me whether this was a fixed or flexible loan. I told them that it was a flexible loan - I'm not sure whether this has a bearing on what happened next.

The call operative couldn't tell me whether the previous month's payment which I have a receipt for, had been applied to the account. He said that it probably would be within a couple of days, and that I could ignore the letter.

He also couldn't confirm that my June payment was outstanding yet (a couple of days had passed since the payment was meant to go through). He offered to take the payment by credit card anyway.

He also asked me if I wanted to pay an additional amount by credit card to my loan. This was directly contrary to what I had previously been told, but I didn't question it. I asked if I could make a payment of £500 by credit card, and he took the details and gave me a receipt number immediately. He said that the first £50 would go to paying the June premium, and the £450 would be deducted from the balance.

As I said earlier, Santander told me that I could not make any payments by credit card that weren't to clear arrers (either to repay in full, or for a one-off payment).

I believe that they don't actually know what they're doing with Cahoot Loans. Why would the operative ask me whether it was a fixed loan or a flexible? He'd already done standard security checks and I don't believe this was another check.

I don't think they actually have all the details of my loan in front of them.

I'm a bit confused by their continued contrary behaivior toward me, but I have saved myself several months of interest by transferring most of it to my credit card.

Apples2

It's Santander - try to find a positive post about them.

briansmoke

(Santander have written to me telling me that my complaint is taking longer than they anticipated)

Here is this month's update.(My latest rambling about today's phone communication).

I know that I've missed this month's payment (a couple of days ago). I have called today to make the £50 arrears by credit card. I would have liked to have made a further overpayment of about £200 which would have brought the balance to near zero.

Their staff member reverted to the original script, which is paraphrased to - 'I can't take an overpayment, only the arrears amount'

When I asked why I was allowed to do it the month before, she told me that I wasn't in arrears last month when I made my payment. I assured her that I was. She couldn't take the payment for 'fraud reasons'. I asked what she meant, because that doesn't make sense. I asked her if I was at risk of fraud, or whether Santander were at risk of fraud, she told me that that was what they were told to tell customers by their managers! Brilliant.

After me telling her how bad her company was at dealing with customers at length, I paid the amount, and was transferred to complaints.

I have now requested that they send me a transcription of every single phone conversation I have had with them, and every single piece of correspondence they have sent to me as is my right under the data protection act.

I said that I understood that this will cost them a considerable amount of money - I only have to pay £10 for everything.

She is now going to send forms out to me to fill in to achieve this.

I have made it very clear that as an option, someone higher up can dial a phone and call me to accept the remaining balance by credit card, and that if this happens, I won't need all the correspondence. I made it very clear that I don't want a freebie. I will pay my outstanding balance. I explained that I now want to be a responsible borrower, as I don't have a responsible lender.

I was then told that there was no option, but for them to have to send out what I ask for, for a £10 fee. Of course, I need this information so that I can check that I have dealt correctly with Santander over the years, and that they have not made any errors dealing with me. I am absolutely not going to do this specifically to require them under law, to bear the cost of hundreds of pounds so that they can spend hours trawling through their records and typing them up - honest. I'm also going to request copied of all their system notes about my phone calls. I'd like to know what they have written about me.

On the point of last month having being paid and an overpayment being allowed. I was told that this was done in error by Santander, and I have benefitted from this, but they won't do it again.

I should have paid more when I had the chance. -

Oh, I just had an epiphany!

I've been receiving silent calls from Santander over the past 2 weeks or more now. I'll hang up if there isn't anyone on the line for more than a couple of seconds.

OFCOM now has the right to fine companies up to £2 million for making silent calls.

I've just called them up again, and was put through to a resolution manager. I've told him the majority of what I've been through, and I've asked someone to call me within an hour (I've given them an hour and a quarter - until 2pm) to resolve this. If this doesn't happen, I'm giving the info to OFCOM. He knows that all I want to do is pay off my loan.

We'll see what happens.

nomoneytoday

It costs them 2-3% to take the card payment, so will be happy to get back 97% odd of an overdue amount.
If you're not in arrears, why would they take the lower amount?

As above, why not use your credit card for shopping / fuel etc and then pay the balance off with your debit card?
Have you a plan to pay off your non flexible credit card debt before the rate shoots up?

pigsmightfly

Santander are the most pathetic company I have ever dealt with.

I too had a loan with Cahoot that got transferred over to them - worst thing that could have happened.

I was no longer allowed to have my account online etc. so wrote to them to request a current balance statement.

When I received they have changed the interest amount on my fixed rate loan I had. I complained to be told no you took out a flexible one so we can do what we want with the interest. I assured them it was fixed as I had the original paperwork in front of me. I then got a letter off them saying as my account was flexible they could change the interest when they liked - FOS is dealing with this now as they have been taking most of my payment for their interest and they shouldn't have!!

Alos been writing to them about payments amounts due to maternity since November 2010 and still trying to sort it now.

Total idiots that work there and they always give different answers when you speak to different people so good luck and stick at it!!

briansmoke

nomoneytoday wrote: »

As above, why not use your credit card for shopping / fuel etc and then pay the balance off with your debit card?
Have you a plan to pay off your non flexible credit card debt before the rate shoots up?

They won't take a debit card either for payments. The loan was converted from a fully flexible one with Cahoot into a zero-features, increased-interest one, with Santander.

I've got 13 months (12 now) to repay the credit card at 0%, which should be acheiveable. It will cost me a bit more a month, but will save me lots in the long run.