MSE News: Wonga branded 'morally offensive' for targeting students

poppy10_2

im-lost wrote: »

If he cared to read the wonga advert properly, it makes no mention of a wonga loan replacing a student loan

Really? Because to me it looked like they were actively trying to encourage people to take out a Wonga loan rather than a student loan. The page was even titled "Wonga Loan - Alternative to Education Loans":

Wonga wrote:

if you want to budget during uni, only take out the student loan that you think you'll need and if you need to borrow a small sum for up to a month to cover an emergency, you could top up your funds with a Wonga loan

This was undeniably irresponsible behaviour from Wonga to target payday loans at students who don't have a paycheque or regular income to repay them. You can argue about personal responsibility but we are talking about young people who are often experiencing budgeting and banking for the first time in their lives.

Wonga is a big company which purports to act ethically, they should have known better. They've done the right thing by taking the page down now, Martin and MSE should be applauded for their role in this.

P.S. their statement about this just being boilerplate text for search engine optimization, not meant to be read by the public seems a bit bogus, they'd made a custom video with the same content, and the contents of video don't get indexed by any search engine.

callum9999

dealer_wins wrote: »

If only schools would teach household finance/budgeting as a subject, then maybe most kids would understand what a horrific ripoff payday loans are.

I don't think people give students enough credit...

They aren't morons, they will know it's a high APR but that is irrelevant. They may need money quick and are satisfied with the fee for having it for a few days - regardless of whether you or I would be.

You could argue that students are too eager to get into debt without thinking about the long term consequences but a) that cannot be taught, and b) that is often misjudged. People often make the same judgement of me if I detail my personal borrowing choices etc. - but if you actually look into it closely it makes perfect sense.

poppy10_2

This page is still up:

http://www.wonga.com/money/wonga-tv-wonga-student-loan/

MusicalLawyer

It does say on their site how much you'd have to pay back if you borrowed x amount over x days. So it isn't like students need mad maths skills to work it out. They know what they're getting, and what to pay back and when it's due. You have to be 18+ so they are adults and can make informed decision themselves.

I'm a student myself and used this horrific company for a Payday loan in May 2010 - I am still paying it back now as it went to debt recovery. (I ended up owing £500 in the end). I will finish the payments August 2012.

It was my own fault.
I needed money and I was very poor and very very hungry.

DCFC79

The PDL are hardly holding a gun to the heads of the students and saying "you must take the loan out", students should be able to decide whether a PDL is worth it or not.

2sides2everystory

Duke203 wrote: »

The slow erosion of personal responsibility continues it's advance.

Really? And the rapid erosion of corporate moral responsibility should continue unabated, should it? I think not. And since impressionable young students may be visiting this thread in order to pick up good habits, may I just point out there is no apostrophe in the possessive "its"?

MSE Towers' power was used in a good way today.

Looks like one page is fixed: http://www.wonga.com/money/wonga-student-loan/

But that duplicate page http://www.wonga.com/money/wonga-tv-wonga-student-loan/ with the slightly different URL is still there as I post this

Alpine_Star

sharpy2010 wrote: »

Every poster above has stated that the article provided by the MSE site is actually an erosion into personal choice.

Yes and they're wrong.

The removal of the advert is not capable of 'limiting personal choice'. Students have just as much choice in whom they choose to borrow from now than they had this morning.

digitaltoast

I'm in two minds about this. In one respect, I'm all for free markets, but...

callum9999 wrote: »

I don't think people give students enough credit...

They aren't morons,

Actually, I'm afraid a vast amount are. In fact, every single one who marched last summer IN FAVOUR of a most expensive, earlier payback, is a moron.
It's like turkeys marching in favour of an earlier Christmas

As far as student finance goes, if you're talking about moral repugnance, you can fine no-one more bankrupt than the NUS and their hateful lie-factory, confusing and scaring students, using them as "useful idiots" for their own political ends.

So while I find Wonga fairly hateful, they look like saints compared to the NUS...

Just another reason for teaching finance in schools...

MsDaisy

"Paying off your student loan can take years and the chances are you'll have no idea what you spent it on.That's the problem with a student loan – it might work out cheaper than a standard loan, but you can easily get more than you need and be left with a nasty debt hangover after graduation."

Wonga APR 4214%

Student loan APR 1.5%


I know which company I'd rather my DS had a loan with

more_money_for_me

Don't feel "outraged", but can't see why people think it is a bad thing this story being aired. The site is about educating people about finances/money saving, and if it has alerted people to the cost of borrowing in this way then surely it has done its job.