Wonga/Payday Express - Why don't they play ball?

Apples2

endora wrote: »

but it can do something like capping interest as posted above -that would be a start!

Give us some real life figures.
Lets suppose you are starting up a PDL company, your target customer is someone who has a history of not repaying debts.

You are going to lend this guy £200 for 30 days. What would you want back as a REAL figure? What do you think would make it worthwhile for your business (with premises to rent, staff to pay etc?)

The PDL companies charge a fixed sum to borrow, this reflects in a MASSIVE APR when extrapolated over a whole year. However, it is not intended to be over a year is it? only a matter of days/weeks.

Suppose you limit the APR to a sensible figure... if you default on the payment and enter the capped APR, you would end up repaying LESS than you would have done if you settled on time!

If you limit the APR to a sensible figure from the outset, you wouldn't be able to make a business out of it. Your return would be paltry and not worth the risk in lending to these people.

My last loan was £7.5K over three years, the bank made the princely sum of about £700 from me, but remember, my loan was £7,500 over THREE YEARS, not a few quid over a few days.

Your business would not be sustainable.

Try to propose a workable solution rather than just putting the product down.

For clarity, I have zero connection with any lender, I do not work in any financial field, I have not taken a PDL and I never would.

malkyh

It's the same old argument time and time again.

People borrowing from these lenders knowing full well how high the APR rate and also the consequences of defaulting.

Most if not all borrowing from these companies have bad credit due to defaults etc in the past. Then come the endless threads about how they borrowed money off these companies and didn't pay back on time and now they are being charged a lot of money blah de blah de blah, and how evil these companies are etc etc etc.

YOU had a choice. YOU chose to take the loan. YOU defaulted. YOU are now being hammered as YOU were aware of when YOU took the loan. Yes, it's unfortunate but YOU are responsible for your own actions.

I for one am not going to give you the sympathy act because you are now worse off than when you were before taking out the loan. You knew the terms before you got the cash.

asbokid

endora wrote: »

Don't know what sort of system they use -there may be an online record all PDL companies are obliged to search.

From a brief read of the Federal Law [1], the Department of Defense Report that spurred that Law [2] and an 2005 academic study on military indebtedness [3], it appears that:

The onus is on the borrower to disclose to the lender that he is a "covered person". A covered person is any serving member of the US military, and also any dependent, including children up to the age of 22 and in education.

Predatory Lenders cannot under Federal Law lend to any of those "covered persons".

Once the loan applicant has disclosed his protected status, the onus shifts to the lender. If the lender nevertheless issues a loan to that covered person, or continues to enforce his debt, then he does so knowingly. At that point, the lender is committing a Criminal Offense under Federal Law, for which he can be fined, jailed or both.

If the serviceman (or his dependent) forgets to disclose his military status to a lender, no offense is committed by the serviceman, nor his dependent if he or she made the loan application.

Furthermore, since the payday loan was issued to the covered person in violation of Federal Law, the debt is not enforceable. Here, the Law says, "any credit agreement, promissory note, or other contract prohibited under this section is void from the inception of such contract."

In addition, for the purposes of Department of Defense Directive 1344.9, a Payday Loan is NOT a "just debt obligation" [4] As such, there is no risk of proceedings of Court Martial for non-payment of a prohibited payday loan.

Finally, when a service member fails to pay a "just financial obligation" (of which any loan above the statutory 36% APR is obviously NOT 'just')... even then, the DoD Components "have no legal authority to require members to pay a private debt or to divert any part of their pay for satisfaction of a private debt."

In the end if you lie then it's your problem the law can't do everything for you but it can do something like capping interest as posted above -that would be a start!

Even when the US serviceperson (or his dependent) has lied about his military status, the PDL company cannot enforce its debt in any way, shape or form.

So it is hard cheese for the scum behind wonga and other rogue payday lenders. When those gangsters knowingly lend to any "covered person", their next Registered Address could be Federal Jail!

WARNING: To the following directors of Quickbridge (UK) Ltd, trading as 'wonga.com'.. issue any Usurious Payday loan to a Covered Person in the US Visiting Forces, and face the consequences:

Mr Iftikar Ali Ahmed , Mr Meyer Malka , Mr Errol Damelin , Mr Jonathan Brent Hurwitz , Mr Bernard Liautaud , Mr Robin Matthew Klein , Ms Laurel Charmaine Bowden , Ms Sonali De Rycker


[1] http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/getdoc.cgi?dbname=109_cong_bills&docid=f:h5122enr.txt.pdf
[2] http://www.defense.gov/pubs/pdfs/report_to_congress_final.pdf
[3] http://www.csun.edu/~sg4002/research/pdf/graves_peterso,n_OSLJ_final%20published%20version.pdf
[4] http://www.dtic.mil/whs/directives/corres/pdf/134409p.pdf

asbokid

Apples2 wrote: »

I have zero connection with any lender, I do not work in any financial field.

nevertheless, you spend hundreds of hours defending loansharks and the payday loan industry???!!!!

something just doesn't ring true in your protestations.

you should explain precisely your field of employment.

best guess is your work is in propaganda, "marketing" or "communications".. certainly it must be one of the fields infested by con-artists, tricksters, and other hoods.

dealer_wins

asbokid wrote: »

nevertheless, you spend hundreds of hours defending loansharks and the payday loan industry???!!!!

something just doesn't ring true in your protestations.

you should explain precisely your field of employment.

best guess is your work is in propaganda, "marketing" or "communications".. certainly it must be one of the fields infested commonly by con-artists, tricksters, and other nefarious hoods.

He is defending the legally of the company to operate. Which it does, perfectly legally.

malkyh

asbokid wrote: »

nevertheless, you spend hundreds of hours defending loansharks and the payday loan industry???!!!!

something just doesn't ring true in your protestations.

you should explain precisely your field of employment.

best guess is your work is in propaganda, "marketing" or "communications".. certainly it must be one of the fields infested commonly by con-artists, tricksters, and other nefarious hoods.

Like myself, what he does is tell it like it is when it comes to people whining about defaulting on payday loans.

You are becoming pretty tiresome to be honest. I'm getting fed up of reading the copy and paste results of your frantic Google searches.

anxious_mum

These are the facts, as I see them.

1) You are so desperate that the only option open to you is to take out a payday loan

2) You are so desperate that the only option open to you is to go to a dodgy loan shark character

So, in the current climate, the best option is to go for 1), but you MUST abide by the rules that they state, in full, before you take their money. Or, if you go for 2) and you can't pay it back, be prepared for a couple of broken knee caps, and lots of hassle.

From what I've seen on this site, the payday loans are OK so long as you play by their rules. If you can't, then don't do it!

If the payday loans disappeared, there would be a lot of people who would have no alternative but to go to the second plan. I think, in my humble opinion (and as someone who has never used them), there is room for these payday loan companies, but the users must realise what they are getting themselves into, and make sure they have a plan to pay them back!

dtsazza

That's the thing about conspiracies - there's nothing we like less than being found out by a clever individual who has the unique capacities required to see through our charade...

asbokid

dtsazza wrote: »

can you add me to the list

identify your professional background, and if it satisfies the criteria i will indeed add you to the list of those believed to be working this forum professionally (and covertly) to promote the payday loan industry. if you choose not to identify your professional background, or you are deemed to be lying, an adverse inference may be drawn. very simple choice. what will it be?

anxious_mum

dtsazza wrote: »

That's the thing about conspiracies - there's nothing we like less than being found out by a clever individual who has the unique capacities required to see through our charade...

OOOh, should I be reading my Red Book now, or what?