Failure to repay lender under agreed terms

mobilemobile15

Hi,

A couple of months ago, I borrowed £1400 from a lender in the USA through the Reddit borrow sub (reddit.com/r/borrow), with the agreement of paying back £1680 in two instalments.

I was hit by unforeseen financial difficulties after moving into my new house, shortly before my first agreed instalment date, and therefore I missed the first agreed payment date.

So far, I have only managed to pay back £100 in total. I have been in regular contact with the lender and have made him aware I will be sending over monthly instalments, albeit a lot less than the originally agreed amount.

Just recently he has started to ignore my messages, so I am assuming this is due to some sort of legal advice he has obtained.

For context, he is publically giving out short term loans on a daily basis on this reddit borrowing forum, so I assume he either does this professionally or as a prolific side income.

Due to the nature of the reddit borrowing forum, there is not a formal application process. You post an ad for how much you are looking to borrow, how much you would like to repay etc and a lender will contact you. The requirements depend solely on what the lender asks for.
In my case, I had to send a selfie with a piece of paper being held up stating how much I had borrowed and how much I would pay back.

Can I be charged with criminal offences due to this? I have been in constant contact with the lender and, although I have only paid back a fraction of what was originally agreed, I am still making payments and will continue to do so.


Thank you.

Arleen

No need to worry about anything criminal, but he may seek civil court action against you if you will stop paying.
He probably is just tired of hearing excuses, which is why he doesn't responding, so best to just keep on paying what you can until you will repay it in full.

antrobus

mobilemobile15 wrote: »

..Just recently he has started to ignore my messages, so I am assuming this is due to some sort of legal advice he has obtained...

He is probably trying to work out how the bleep he can recover his money from someone who lives on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean.

mobilemobile15 wrote: »

...Can I be charged with criminal offences due to this? ..

Err, no. People regularly default on their loans. It's a civil matter.

[Deleted User]

mobilemobile15 wrote: »

In my case, I had to send a selfie with a piece of paper being held up stating how much I had borrowed and how much I would pay back.

Well, that all sounds perfectly normal and above board.

k3lvc

mobilemobile15 wrote: »

Just recently he has started to ignore my messages, so I am assuming this is due to some sort of legal advice he has obtained.

Legal advice :rotfl: - my suspicion is that he's investing his time on t'interweb contacting some local scrotes to some and recover the money from you


Given the seriousness you placed on fulfilling your side of the agreement I can't imagine he'll play be the rules

[Deleted User]

Seems a nice way to launder money.

SparklesJD

Genuine question - is this even legal in the UK?!

Why would someone lend in this way?

macman

Crucial question-how does the lender know that the person pictured in the selfie is actually you, and not some random image from the net which has then been subjected to a quick bit of Photoshopping?
I would have thought that 20% interest on such a loan was exceedingly low, given the near impossibility of collecting should the borrower default-as in your case.

mobilemobile15

You have to have had a Reddit account with regular comment history for over a year. Also had to submit ID which matches up with the photo. I've used the borrowing sub a couple of times before and repaid straight away on time, which a bot verifies youre track record.

SnowTiger

https://www.reddit.com/r/borrow/wiki/lenders

I've had a quick gander at the information.

It appears that lenders are advised to make loans via PayPal as a purchases.

Then, open a PayPal dispute if the borrower doesn't repay the loan.