I have come here to chew bubblegum and clear debt - and I'm all outta bubblegum AKA the £83,000 saga

redmel1621 wrote: »

Wow! Well done for sharing and I wish you all the luck in the world. I also want to say that your wife is an absolute star for standing by and supporting you.

I will definitely be keeping an eye on how things are going for you.

Thank you and yes she is :-)

Toomuchdebt wrote: »

You've done amazingly well to reduce it so quickly so far!

Thank You. It wouldn't have been as quick without Resolver!

Back in 2015, I applied for a personal loan from a mainstream peer-to-peer lender (i.e., not a fly-by-night payday outfit).

I did have a loan with them in my pre-gambling past which was all paid off in full and on time.

Between 2009 and 2015, I applied for multiple loans from the same lender, all of which were rejected. During this time, my financial situation had continued to decline - but for reasons that are currently unknown, in 2015 they deemed it adequate to approve a loan of £10,000 at a whopping 16% APR. Remembering I was not in the right frame of mind mentally at this time due to my addiction, I bit their hand off.

With a clear head now, to me it’s pretty clear I wasn’t a suitable candidate for this kind of credit. I already had a five-figure level of debt, including an existing personal loan, overdraft, 5 or 6 maxed out credit cards, payday loans etc. My credit score was naturally way, way down there.

I recently complained to the lender in question under the ‘irresponsible lending’ banner, and they claim to have done nothing wrong. In their ‘final response’ letter they claimed I had put on the application form that the purpose of the loan was to ‘consolidate debt’. Obviously that didn’t happen. In their letter that actually state: “it’s not our fault if you didn’t use the loan to pay off your other debts.”

Whilst they are correct, I was expecting perhaps a little more of a sympathetic response. I had explained all about my addiction and how this loan only helped to fuel it, and that in hindsight given the information available on my credit file and bank statements, I don’t think the loan should have been approved. But they don’t want to know. Other lenders have had dedicated staff to deal with customers who have suffered with addiction issues and have been extremely helpful, professional and understanding. Rightly or wrongly, I just expected more from the lender in question.

As far as I have been made aware from other lenders, existing debt levels are still a factor in lending decisions. Even if you state your intention is to pay off existing loans, this doesn’t usually have an effect on the application, as you might not do it...