MSE News: Wonga busted by the FCA: 330,000 to have their loan wiped

ddgg1233

WongaWonderer wrote: »

When does the period of 0-29 days of arrears start? At the promise date or the point two days later where they levy a £20 fine?

if you have an outstanding loan, log into your account and it will tell you how many days in arrears you are.

GaryBC

tomtontom wrote: »

What happened to people taking responsibility for their own decisions?

If a drowning man clutches at a straw, is that a "decision"? Surely he knows that it is a futile act? The buoyancy increase of a single straw is never going to stop him drowning. He must realise that it will achieve nothing? And yet still he reaches for it.

Why? Sheer desperation, that's why. Those who espouse the view put froward by Tomtontom should consider themselves incredibly fortunate never to have been desperate.

iolanthe07

GaryBC wrote: »

If a drowning man clutches at a straw, is that a "decision"? Surely he knows that it is a futile act? The buoyancy increase of a single straw is never going to stop him drowning. He must realise that it will achieve nothing? And yet still he reaches for it.

Why? Sheer desperation, that's why. Those who espouse the view put froward by Tomtontom should consider themselves incredibly fortunate never to have been desperate.

Good point, but where are people with lousy credit going to go now? Loansharks who come round with a baseball bat? Wonga may be bottom feeders, but they fill a need, and if they tighten up too much on lending criteria, their whole business model will crash.

robin58

Best news of the day!! :beer::j:beer::j:beer:

Always thought Wonga were legalized loan sharks.:eek:

In America pay-loans are more controlled than in UK.

I hope some of those controls are adopted here.

Blackpool_Saver

So will they be paying back all the interest and so called penalties to people who DID pay them off then?

ChrisS1

I got into financial difficulty about 8 months ago. I borrowed from Wonga and paid it back with my wages at the end of the month. 10 minutes after paying the loan back, I would have to take out another Wonga loan. This went on for 5 months - they even increased the amount that I could borrow to a level which was way beyond my income & expenditure. They obviously didn't use credit reference agencies as they would have seen that my level of borrowing was way too much. I ended up going on a Debt Management Plan with StepChange. I still owe Wonga £1062 and I'm 172 days in arrears as of 2nd October. I'm wondering whether I'm one of the 330,000 people who wasn't properly credit checked. If I'm not, then I'll be making a claim for the loan to be wiped.

Also, on one occasion - rather than taking out £800 in one loan, I took out 8 individual £100 loans in one day!

VT82

Blackpool_Saver wrote: »

So will they be paying back all the interest and so called penalties to people who DID pay them off then?

My thoughts exactly.

Putting aside whether Wonga deserve this massive penalty or not, the way this is being implemented is not fair on:

a) someone who would now have qualified to have their whole loan written off, but found a way to repay it - borrowing from a friend or family member, arranging a DMP, refinancing to another payday lender, cash from a loan shark! Imagine how gutted you would be reading this today.

b) someone who is 27/28/29 days in arrears, who now owes, say £500 instead of £750. Woo hoo, you're £250 up??? But how gutted would you be wishing you had borrowed it 1/2/3 days earlier, saving yourself £500!

Not really a fair way of tapering the relief at all.

Apples2

ddgg1233 wrote: »

so my questions are will previous loans be looked into?

So not only are you hopeful of getting off with this one, you are also hopeful of being refunded for all your previous loans? Unbelievable!

I see a ramp up of broker fee victims soon when they all get bounced from wonga.
Good news for Indian call centres and Western Union offices I fear.

phoenix46_2

I wonder if as they are stating they shouldn't have leant to these 330,000 people, they will correct defaults placed on people's credit files as well.

Reaper

phoenix46 wrote: »

I wonder if as they are stating they shouldn't have leant to these 330,000 people, they will correct defaults placed on people's credit files as well.

Surely the whole point is they should have looked at the credit files and seen the person was unable to pay loans back. That makes it important the defaults are kept on for other lenders use.