Wonga profits leap 35% as demand for loans increases

wotsthat

ILW wrote: »

Is there soome rule that says if you are poor you also have to be stupid, or is the the other way round?

I imagine poorer people have a lower strike rate of good choices compared to their richer peers.

Graham_Devon

ILW wrote: »

If things are that tight, how come they can afford to pay all that interest, but could not put away a few pound a week for emergencies?

Many sell stuff to pay the fees. Many get other loans to pay up the wonga loan.

Read the debt board. All the answers are on there from people living in it.

When you say "all that interest" how much do you mean. If someone takes £100 from Wonga for 10 days it costs then £16. When you say "all that interest" it makes it sound a lot more than it is.

There will be some using wonga stupidly, who could budget. But to suggest the poor are stupid and should learn is a rather sweeping, silly statement.

wotsthat

Graham_Devon wrote: »

I'd say it's a total lack of understanding of how some have to live that has you suggesting they just need some education. Maybe the tables could be turned? Maybe looking at how others outside of your privileged position live would be a good place to start....otherwise, to be frank, you are just talking down to people.

..from someone that spent a weekend arguing that it wasn't possible for someone on £30k to 'pretend' they lived on £26k and save the balance.

Why do your poor people always have cars to run and expensive dental treatments? I'd suggest your privileged position makes it impossible for you to imagine that a tight budget involves more than dealing with the inconvenience of dealing with a bald tyre.

ILW

Graham_Devon wrote: »

Many sell stuff to pay the fees. Many get other loans to pay up the wonga loan.

Read the debt board. All the answers are on there from people living in it.

When you say "all that interest" how much do you mean. If someone takes £100 from Wonga for 10 days it costs then £16. When you say "all that interest" it makes it sound a lot more than it is.

There will be some using wonga stupidly, who could budget. But to suggest the poor are stupid and should learn is a rather sweeping, silly statement.

It appears the average user takes out 4 loans per year.

wotsthat

I assume Wonga's peak period is in December when Christmas puts in it's usual surprise appearance.

Graham_Devon

wotsthat wrote: »

..from someone that spent a weekend arguing that it wasn't possible for someone on £30k to 'pretend' they lived on £26k and save the balance.

Why do your poor people always have cars to run and expensive dental treatments? I'd suggest your privileged position makes it impossible for you to imagine that a tight budget involves more than dealing with the inconvenience of dealing with a bald tyre.

Well, people have cars to run in order to get to work and stuff...generally.

I'm not sure I said expensive dental treatments. But could easily cost £49 for an examination and extraction on the NHS. Again something that happens up and down the country day after day. If you haven't got £49 and you are in pain and it's causing other issues, what exactly do you do? If I had to in such a case, I'd use Wonga if I couldn't access money from more traditional methods. Same if I had to keep my car on the road to get to work. Better to use Wonga than to lose the car and therefore lose the ability to earn.

My point isn't to discuss or argue in minute detail the thousands of items which could hit families unexpectedly up and down the country. My point was to suggest there ARE unexpected costs, which budgeting wouldn't cover. I think we all know that and just gave a couple of examples.

Others will be using them for nights out and the like. Up to them I suppose, but you can't simply class everyone as stupid and act as if it's all down to life choices. It's not. No one chooses a lot of the stuff life throws at us. If you have the financial backing to cope with those issues, then great. But if you don't, you are going to have to tackle it and Wonga is one way people tackle such things.

I'm not suggesting it's a good solution either. But it's a solution, and there sometimes aren't many at all.

If you are just going to keep being a little petty and throwing in silly one liners such as christmas as if it's a surprise, then theres really little point in answering your questions. It appears you are simply unwilling to accept that people get hit by unexpected costs which they can't afford. Maybe you need to open your mind instead of talking down to people of lesser means?

MacMickster

wotsthat wrote: »

I imagine poorer people have a lower strike rate of good choices compared to their richer peers.

I suspect that if all of the riches of UK residents were gathered in and then redistributed equally throughout the population, within a very few years most of those who are currently wealthy would be wealthy once more, whilst many of those who currently use Wonga would be using them once again.

kabayiri

I rather suspect many Wonga customers are also those who seek crisis loans and other support means.

I wonder how much of Wonga income can be traced back to the state?

It might be cheaper to introduce StateWonga !

ess0two

A friends son used Wonga,it took him literally 30 mins to deposit £400 into a roulette machine in the local bookmakers.

antrobus

kabayiri wrote: »

I rather suspect many Wonga customers are also those who seek crisis loans and other support means.

I wonder how much of Wonga income can be traced back to the state?

It might be cheaper to introduce StateWonga !

Wonga says;

The majority of our customers are young, single, employed, digitally-savvy and can pay us back on time.

ess0two wrote: »

A friends son used Wonga,it took him literally 30 mins to deposit £400 into a roulette machine in the local bookmakers.

Perhaps that's what they mean by digitally-savvy?