Possible mis-sold loans?

prestonlady86

Hi all, it's a long story but over the last 12 years I have been in a horrible emotional spending cycle, mostly fuelled by stress, mental health problems and relationship issues. I used to get credit cards out (even when I didn't need to) and go on crazy spending sprees just for fun because it used to make me feel better. Extreme emotional spending and general wreckless behaviour I guess.

I used to repay most of them on time until the interest started to pile on and then the repayment became unaffordable and I just used to ignore the creditors. I was wreckless in this way for years and as a result today I am left with circa £26k in outstanding debt across 21 different creditors. My credit record is very poor and of course I can't buy a house or even get a mobile phone in my name.

I have sorted my life out this last couple of years and about a year ago I signed up with StepChange in a bid to tackle my debt. I'm a single parent, working part-time and I pay about £150pm to StepChange across them all. Of course this is going to take a VERY long time to clear and the thought of this debt lingering over me for such a long time makes me feel really down. Even the £150pm is killing me because it means I can't give my 2 year old all the things that other 2 year olds have or go to baby/toddler groups with my mum friends, I always have to lie and say that I am busy because it's too embarrassing to tell that that I don't have the £4.50 entry fees. I do have all our basic needs and bills covered, it's just upsetting that I have done this to myself and now I'm going to be suffering for a long time because of it (it's unlikely I am going to get a pay rise anytime soon until he is school age and I can work more hours). I'm constantly looking for ways to reduce my debt/earn more money.

Anyway, I was telling a close friend about my situation and she was amazed that I was able to get so much credit when I had high outstanding debt on other cards/loans and poor credit rating. She said that there's a possibility that I might have been mis-sold if they didn't due their due diligence and check that I was able to reasonably repay the loan back i.e. a couple of years ago I had a shocking credit score with numerous defaults and missed payments all over it but payday companies still lent me money. I took 5 or 6 out in 1 month! Obviously I defaulted on these within a month or 2 and now I have debts with each of them for almost double the amount due to interest added etc.

Does anyone think I have a chance to challenge some of these? Some of the debts are up to 12 years old (not statue barred), and some are for notoriously 'bad' payday lenders such as Sunny, MyJar, Wage Day Advance, Instant Cash Loans etc. These ones make up almost half of the balance of my outstanding debt.

I also took a couple of high value credit cards out with Virgin and MBNA (12k combined) when I am sure my credit rating would have been awful. I can't prove what my rating was exactly at the time but I check my credit reports regularly and don't recall it being anything other than poor for years. I mean, I had debt collectors hounding me daily at the time when I took these cards out, and I was constantly borrowing from one lender to pay another at one point.

Is there anyway that I can check if they followed the rules when vetting me? Yes, I know that it is my fault for taking these loans out in the first place and I am probably clutching at straws here but I was obviously in a vulnerable state at the time of taking these out so just checking to see if there is some sort of way I can eradicate some of them to alleviate my current financial situation and total debt value.

If you've read this far then thank you!

sourcrates

I fear the ship has sailed on this one.

The majority of the payday lenders you list, have all gone out of business, most had schemes of arrangement authorised by the Insolvency service, customers who alleged their loans were mis-sold had to make there complaints within a certain timeframe, to be included in it.

Most redress was made in early 2021/22, and now these schemes are closed, and no new complaints can be looked at.

There was a lot of publicity at the time, especially on this site, all customers should have been made aware of matters relating to their accounts, and how and when to complain.

Regarding the companies that went bust, not all of their loan books have yet been sold, so that begs the question who are stepchange sending your DMP payments too ?
as the original lenders stopped taking payments years ago, you need to be having a conversation with stepchange about this.

As for the mainstream lenders, unaffordable loan complaints are easy to make, put your concerns in writing and follow the complaints process for your lenders.

The Debt Camel website is a good source of information on how to do this -

Debt Camel · Answers to questions about debts and credit ratings - in plain English!

Other options include submitting CCA requests, asking for your debts to be written off as payments are unaffordable and you will never successfully repay all that you owe, write offs on mental health grounds, you have a few choices here.

sparks_2023

You can still get refunds on the interest on some payday loans. I got some recompense from CashAsap for instance recently.

Unfortunately all the loans companies you list are ancient history now and it is too late for claims against them.

Off the top of my head, if you had any loans with Fernovo/Quidie, Moneyboat, Lending Stream, CashAsap, Mr Lender, Cash4uNow and no doubt a couple of others, you may still have a chance of a successful claim.

cymruchris

prestonlady86 said:

I used to repay most of them on time until the interest started to pile on and then the repayment became unaffordable and I just used to ignore the creditors. I was wreckless in this way for years and as a result today I am left with circa £26k in outstanding debt across 21 different creditors. My credit record is very poor and of course I can't buy a house or even get a mobile phone in my name.

I can't advise on the mis-selling of loans - but having read through your post, and seeing that you've been on the straight and narrow if I might call it that for the last couple of years, and have been with step change for a year, you mention that you have no property, therefore if you have no assets with a debt of £26k - are you currently working through a 12 month debt relief order? Or are you currently on an IVA?

sourcrates

cymruchris said:

prestonlady86 said:

I used to repay most of them on time until the interest started to pile on and then the repayment became unaffordable and I just used to ignore the creditors. I was wreckless in this way for years and as a result today I am left with circa £26k in outstanding debt across 21 different creditors. My credit record is very poor and of course I can't buy a house or even get a mobile phone in my name.

I can't advise on the mis-selling of loans - but having read through your post, and seeing that you've been on the straight and narrow if I might call it that for the last couple of years, and have been with step change for a year, you mention that you have no property, therefore if you have no assets with a debt of £26k - are you currently working through a 12 month debt relief order? Or are you currently on an IVA?

Looks more like a DMP to me, you don`t make any payments in a DRO, and Stepchange don`t do IVA`s, they use a separate IP for that.

The OP was active on the 27th June, be nice to have some kind of response from them.

cymruchris

sourcrates said:

cymruchris said:

prestonlady86 said:

I used to repay most of them on time until the interest started to pile on and then the repayment became unaffordable and I just used to ignore the creditors. I was wreckless in this way for years and as a result today I am left with circa £26k in outstanding debt across 21 different creditors. My credit record is very poor and of course I can't buy a house or even get a mobile phone in my name.

I can't advise on the mis-selling of loans - but having read through your post, and seeing that you've been on the straight and narrow if I might call it that for the last couple of years, and have been with step change for a year, you mention that you have no property, therefore if you have no assets with a debt of £26k - are you currently working through a 12 month debt relief order? Or are you currently on an IVA?

Looks more like a DMP to me, you don`t make any payments in a DRO, and Stepchange don`t do IVA`s, they use a separate IP for that.

The OP was active on the 27th June, be nice to have some kind of response from them.

Makes sense - in the back of my mind I was wondering if the OP was on the best option having nearly £30k of debt and what sounded like paying £150 a month ongoing for who knows how long.

prestonlady86

sourcrates said:

I fear the ship has sailed on this one.

The majority of the payday lenders you list, have all gone out of business, most had schemes of arrangement authorised by the Insolvency service, customers who alleged their loans were mis-sold had to make there complaints within a certain timeframe, to be included in it.

Most redress was made in early 2021/22, and now these schemes are closed, and no new complaints can be looked at.

There was a lot of publicity at the time, especially on this site, all customers should have been made aware of matters relating to their accounts, and how and when to complain.

Regarding the companies that went bust, not all of their loan books have yet been sold, so that begs the question who are stepchange sending your DMP payments too ?
as the original lenders stopped taking payments years ago, you need to be having a conversation with stepchange about this.

As for the mainstream lenders, unaffordable loan complaints are easy to make, put your concerns in writing and follow the complaints process for your lenders.

The Debt Camel website is a good source of information on how to do this -


Other options include submitting CCA requests, asking for your debts to be written off as payments are unaffordable and you will never successfully repay all that you owe, write offs on mental health grounds, you have a few choices here.

Thank you, that's really useful. I did some digging on debt camel following your reply and yes, I can see that some of these have gone bust already so I've missed the boat on the complaints. I've found a few that are still live though so I have just submitted my first unaffordable complaint via resolver. Fingers crossed! Just getting the high £ number down slightly will hopefully make it seem less overwhelming.

You mention that I could ask for payments to be written off due to being unaffordable and the fact that I'll never be able to repay them anytime in the near future.. do you know if that works with debt collectors? I.e. the ones I am sending payments to for the creditors who have since gone bust.

prestonlady86

sparks_2023 said:

You can still get refunds on the interest on some payday loans. I got some recompense from CashAsap for instance recently.

Unfortunately all the loans companies you list are ancient history now and it is too late for claims against them.

Off the top of my head, if you had any loans with Fernovo/Quidie, Moneyboat, Lending Stream, CashAsap, Mr Lender, Cash4uNow and no doubt a couple of others, you may still have a chance of a successful claim.

Thanks for that. Funnily enough Fernovo were the very last company I borrowed from and since my last post they have applied for a CCJ (they rejected the stepchange offer but were still being paid). To prevent this happening I'm now paying £75 per month to them on top of my stepchange amounts. Luckily due to increases my benefits are being increased by circa £90 from this month, so that covers that. 

My credit was definitely in it's worst state ever though by the time I applied and got approved by Fernovo so I probably do have a claim with them however, they've been so awful and aggressive with their debt collecting tactics and being so hasty to apply for a CCJ so quickly. I'm scared to protest it now in case they get p*ssed off with me and just re-apply for the CCJ.

prestonlady86

cymruchris said:

prestonlady86 said:

I used to repay most of them on time until the interest started to pile on and then the repayment became unaffordable and I just used to ignore the creditors. I was wreckless in this way for years and as a result today I am left with circa £26k in outstanding debt across 21 different creditors. My credit record is very poor and of course I can't buy a house or even get a mobile phone in my name.

I can't advise on the mis-selling of loans - but having read through your post, and seeing that you've been on the straight and narrow if I might call it that for the last couple of years, and have been with step change for a year, you mention that you have no property, therefore if you have no assets with a debt of £26k - are you currently working through a 12 month debt relief order? Or are you currently on an IVA?

It's just a DMP. Stepchange said there are going to review it every so often - I assume because at the minute I'll be paying this off well into my retirement!

sourcrates

prestonlady86 said:

You mention that I could ask for payments to be written off due to being unaffordable and the fact that I'll never be able to repay them anytime in the near future.. do you know if that works with debt collectors? I.e. the ones I am sending payments to for the creditors who have since gone bust.

If your circumstances demand it, then yes, it does depend on your individual situation, but if you have little money and/or are suffering from any kind of long term illness that may affect your income, you can write and ask whoever owns your debts to consider writing them off.

You would need medical evidence, or Dr`s letter, you can find mental health assessment forms online (I forget their correct name) its not always a quick process, and can take time, but some posters have had great success.

You should not be put off from making a complaint, or a CCA request either, doing either of these things will not have any impact on whether a company takes legal action or not, and judgements are not an automatic gimmie, you have the opportunity to defend a claim.