Watchdogs warn of Christmas loan sharks

9:19am Saturday 8th December 2012 in News

The Stop Loan Sharks Project, which is supported by City of York Council, is cracking down on illegal doorstep lending over Christmas.

The scheme aims to put an end to the practices and discourages people from using illegal moneylenders.

City of York Council’s Trading Standards team have warned that what may seem like a small loan to tide people over for Christmas could end up costing them well into the New Year and beyond. They warn that in some cases, violence has been used, including a victim who was kidnapped and a female victim who was raped.

Comments(7)

bob the builder says...
11:23am Sat 8 Dec 12

Which is why the credit union was supposedly started - and what happened there? Until central government puts a reliable scheme in place to help people who can't get finance through normal commercial channels they have no option, but these people often don't vote so they're not of interest.

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ian923 says...
12:08pm Sat 8 Dec 12

I don't know about the illegal money lenders but it's time the crazy legal TV adverts for payday loans and cash were stopped with interest rates between 2000 and 4000+% rates. They really are a disgrace enticing people to take loans some of whom will not understand or be able to pay the terms which land them in even more trouble.

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Pedro says...
1:20pm Sat 8 Dec 12

This message was brought to you by Wonga dot com.

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scampbell88 says...
10:20pm Sat 8 Dec 12

This is kind of scary. I got a loan from xmasloans.net but everything with them seems to be great and they even gave me this month interest free.

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Magicman! says...
4:16am Sun 9 Dec 12

Nevermind doorstep loan sharks... get rid of the glorified legalised loan sharks: aka QuickQuid and Wonga.com - with insane rates of interest (mentioned above at between 2000%-4000% APR) the 'fast money now' principle in the advert appeals to those who are broke and are idiots, and then end up in more debt than they started off with. Plus Wonga.com should be stopped anyway because their adverts are just just plainly awful... they are simply terrible.... those adverts are in insult to my eyes, and if I ever got kidnapped and they showed me an endless loop of these adverts I would break off the chair leg and blind myself with it so I didn't have to watch the adverts!!

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jgycfc says...
11:32pm Sun 9 Dec 12

They're not just on telly, they have shops On Bridge Street (YP note, Bridge Street, not Micklegate, Skeldergate, any other street you'd get wrong :p )

http://www.endlegall
oansharks.org.uk/ and there's an e-gov petition somewhere to make it be discussed proper in parliament.

If the UK / OFT put a cap on the APR, there'd be much reduced markets for loan sharks, and the "loan wolves" in mutton's clothing that abide loosely by the law would have to rethink their attitude too.

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Kevin Turvey says...
11:26am Wed 12 Dec 12

I rangs Wonga.com and asked them if they had savings acounts with similar high rates of interest as their loans.

Funnily enough they put the phone down on me!

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