Non-Standard Finance group (NSF) proposed a Scheme of Arrangement in March 2023. This Scheme was approved in June 23.
NSF had three brands: Everyday Loans (lending from high street shops) and George Banco and Trust Two (two guarantor lenders). All customers with loans that started before 31 March 2021 had to make a claim to the Scheme before 31 December 2023.
That date has now passed and no further claims can be made to the Scheme.
If you had an Everyday Loan that started after 31 March 2021, you can still make a complaint about this, but not through the Scheme – so if it is upheld you will get a larger payout.
People who made a claim to the Scheme are now waiting for decisions and eventually any payout.
Contents
What is “a Scheme of Arrangement”?
What is the purpose of a Scheme?
A Scheme is a formal legal arrangement that allows a firm to change the rights of some or all of its creditors.
Customers who have been given an unaffordable loan (see below for a definition of this) have the right to make a complaint and take it to the Ombudsman if the lender rejects it. People will normally get a refund of interest if they win their case.
A Scheme changes these rights:
- any affordability complaints have to be made within a 6 month window – no one can make a claim after that even if they did not know about the Scheme;
- the decision to uphold or reject the complaint is then made within the Scheme and there is no right of appeal to the Financial Ombudsman;
- people owed a refund in cash will only be paid a percentage of it as there is a limited amount of money that all refunds have to be paid from.
So the lender gains as they will pay less to settle these complaints and at the end of the Scheme there can’t be any more complaints.
Other similar Schemes
NSF is now the 5th bad credit lender to seek the protection of a Scheme that will limit the refunds it has to pay to its customers for unaffordable lending:
- schemes by ICL (payday loans eg the Money Shop) and Provident (doorstep lending) have completed. Each paid out about 5% to customers who had their claims upheld
- an Amigo (guarantor loans) Scheme is underway but Amigo failed to raised the necesary capital to continue in business. so it will be liquidated when the Scheme ends.
- Morses Club had a Scheme approved but it then went into administration and their scheme failed.
What is unaffordable lending?
A lender has to check that a loan is affordable for customers before giving the loan.
For Everyday Loans, this is a check on the affordability for the borrower (or borrowers where the loan is a joint loan);
With guarantor loans from George Banco and Trust Two, the loan has to be affordable for both the borrower and the guarantor. A guarantor has to be able to make the repayments out of spare income – simply owning a house does not mean that a loan is affordable.
The Financial Ombudsman (FOS) has set out what it looks at in an affordability complaint.
A simple summary is that when the loan was given it has to have been likely that you could repay it on time, without having to borrow more or get behind with bills. So if all the loan payments were made on time, the loan may still have been unaffordable if repaying it meant that your credit card balance or overdraft increased.
Recent Everyday Loans are NOT included in the Scheme
The Scheme covers customers who borrowed or guaranteed a loan from Everyday Loans, George Banco or Trust Two before 31 March 2021.
It does NOT cover Everyday Loans made after March 2021. If you have one of these later loans this Scheme is not relevant.
Instead you can make an affordability complaint in the usual way. See Affordability complaints about large loans for a template to use,
If your complaint is rejected, send it to the Financial Ombudsman (FOS) straight away, as that article explains. FOS will be able to look at these complaints as they are about loans that are not included in the Scheme.
The Scheme timetable
- 28 April 2023 – Court Convening hearing – approved the voting arrangements
- May & early June 2023 – voting on the Scheme.
- 22 June 2023 – Court Sanction hearing – approved the Scheme
- July to end December 2023 – customers have 6 months to submit a claim to the Scheme. Claims after this point will not be considered in the Scheme and will not be able to go to FOS.
- by end December 2023 – NSF raises enough money to continue and pays £14m into the Scheme to be distributed. If this is not successful the company is likely to go into administration.
- April 2024 – refunds paid from the Scheme.
Raising the £14m for the Scheme
NSF originally proposed two ways to raise new capital – Plan A and Plan B. Since March it has abandoned Plan A and now proposes:
a transfer of the Group’s business to the secured lenders in exchange for the release of a portion of their secured debt and the provision of a new lending facility. Part of the proceeds from this new lending facility would be used to fund the Scheme Fund and cover the costs of the Scheme.
This has not changed the amount of money that is likely to be available to distribute in the proposed Scheme.
Make a claim to the Scheme
It is now too late to make a claim to the Scheme.
What happens after you have made a Claim
NSF will decide whether to uphold your Claim.
I think it’s worth checking your Portal Account every month to see if there is an update there.
If your claim is rejected you can appeal this, but there will be a time limit. So don’t forget to keep looking for this.
What refund may you get?
If an affordability complaint is upheld in the Scheme, the compensation (called “redress”) is calculated:
- for upheld loans that have been repaid, the redress is the interest paid;
- for outstanding upheld loans, interest is removed so the borrower only has to repay in total the amount they borrowed. This may mean a lower balance is owed or that the loan cleared and a cash refund is due.
Where your balance is being reduced or cleared, this will be paid “in full”.
But where a cash refund is calculated, you will not receive that amount. The amount you will get will depend on the total cash refunds calculated and the amount of money in the Scheme to be distributed.
NSF says customers may get paid 24-31% of the calculated cash refund
This is a very uncertain estimate. It depends on how many people make a claim to the Scheme.
It also depends on how many of the claims are upheld and how many of the loans in each claim are upheld.
Credit records
NSF is likely to remove loans that it decides are unaffordable from your credit record.
Should you carry on paying NSF for a current loan?
You are still legally liable for the loan – the NSF Scheme does not change this.
Ring-fencing new payments
NSF wants to encourage customers with a current loan to continue making payments while their claim is being decided in the Scheme.
So these payments will be “ring-fenced” when the customers has made a claim. Then they can be refunded in full if the claim is upheld rather than just a percentage being refunded.
However it may be 6-8 months before your claim is decided in the Scheme. That is a long while to have to carry on making payments to a loan which may eventually be decided to be unaffordable…
If paying is causing you problems
If you are currently struggling to pay NSF, perhaps being behind with priority bills or having to borrow more on credit cards or catalogues, then carrying on paying them for a loan that may be decided to be unaffordable is not a good idea.
In general, it is probably better for most people having difficulty paying one of these loans to stop paying or offer a low affordable payment. This will harm your credit record but if you later win the claim, that negative mark will be removed from your credit record.
If you are the borrower for a guarantor loan, NSF is legally entitled to ask the guarantor to pay if you do not, but they will not be able to take any legal action against the guarantor until your claim has been decided in the Scheme.
If you default on other debts or don’t pay important bills or borrow elsewhere in order to pay NSF, you may end up in a much worse position even if your NSF claim is eventually upheld.
To get specific advice on your case, I suggest you talk to National Debtline on 0808 808 4000, or visit your local Citizens Advice if you have problems with priority debts and bills.
kos07 says
“We are in the process of getting a statement together to be sent out. Unfortunately, the independent adjudicator contacted us on Thursday morning saying they need more time to complete their assessments. ”
June it is.
Mariola Daniel Baszkiewicz says
Good morning,
Where I would be able to check if and how much I might possibly have from the scheme of Everyday loans . I sent my form long time ago but heard nothing since.
Thanks
Sally says
You would need to log into the portal.
https://www.nsfclaims.co.uk/
John C says
Next update on NSF website, should be at some point in the next week. If you go back through the comments, payment is likely to be in June. No idea currently of the % payment yet
Have you had correspondence to say if your claim was upheld or not? If yes then its just waiting on that update. If not, you need to get in touch with them as the process for raising claims is closed now. Some people had missed emails with rejections, and the chance to appeal is probably up
Marc says
Which form did you fill out? I don’t recall filling in any forms and my claim has been upheld in the portal since Aug ’23. Did anyone else fill out any kind of form?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
You could describe the portal as an online form.
AB says
I was thinking the same Marc did we not just press an online button ?? Was the form to do with the start of the process and stating if with agreed or not with the scheme as I remember that vaguely ?? ( I might be wrong) I personally never filled in a form just the process through portal with ref claim number then applying in june last year and waiting for a response which I had fully upheld in August 23. I think may be the scheme vote letter ???
Michael says
You didn’t need to fill out a form. Everything was done through the portal, so please don’t worry.
If you can see your claim is upheld on the portal, you will be paid, most likely in June. % not yet known.
Loz Cuss says
The website now says August for payments
John C says
Update on website (dated 12th April, though only seen it today) now saying earliest payment will be August.
Although initial outcome letters have been sent to claimants, we still need to fully complete the appeals process of all claims before we will be able to calculate the final claim values (and make any cash payments under the scheme). There has been a delay in the appeal adjudication process starting and we currently expect that it will take at least a month before the scheme adjudicator has started to process and reach determinations on claims referred to them, which they will continue to assess on a rolling basis. As such we expect the earliest any distribution can be made is likely to be around August 2024.
Please note that that the appeal adjudication process involves both Everyday Lending Limited (ELL) and Norton Rose Fulbright (NRF), the Scheme Adjudicator, and is part of the overall process of the Scheme. We are in constant dialogue with the Scheme Adjudicator and are working to progress claims as promptly as possible.
Leanne says
I’ve just been onto their website and it now says August for payments!
So in the space of a few weeks it’s went from April to June and now August
Sara (Debt Camel) says
yes!
there are about a dozen more comments all saying the same thing, so I’m not publishing them all
Leanne says
Even though they have updated the website can we still expect a report by the 21st April as suggested before?
Ryan says
I wouldn’t mind if an actual explanation was given as to why but it’s not giving any facts to back up the issue . Terrible
Marc says
They ain’t going to give an update which implicates themselves or the Adjudicator in being the cause of the delay. If there was a real genuine unavoidable reason, they would state it, so the lack of reasoning only leaves one conclusion as far as I’m concerned.
It’s just bad management/supervision. I could understand them missing the deadline by a couple of weeks, maybe a month due to unforeseen issues. But their latest stab in the dark is August, 4 months late, I’m sorry, but someone’s F$%cked up….
Andy says
I wonder if the FCA would look into how they’ve handled this and punish accordingly. It’s been approved by the courts so surely there’s a time limit for this to be dealt with.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
the Scheme has a lot of wiggle room for timescales.
J says
Having dealt with the FCA over serious failings by a financial firm in the past, I can tell you making a report to the FCA will do absolutely nothing and at best the FCA would look at this in 2-3 years’ time. It just isn’t worth the hassle.
kos07 says
I personally think we should have the option now to have our claims open for review and potential appeal.
Another one bites the dust says
Why? What’s that going to solve?
It will only further delay the process as timelines have to be done for opening portal/closing portal time taken to review and adjudicate.
George says
Anyone know what “the delay in starting adjudication” was caused by?
Zoe says
Someone on this thread called the adjudicators just before Easter and they confirmed NSF hadnt sent any claims. I appealed last September and they have only just sent these over. So seems the delay is with NSF,
Zoe says
New notice on the front page of website. Mentioning a delay in adjudication, when it was only NSF that delayed this… however also mentions August likely for payout at the very earliest.
“As such we expect the earliest any distribution can be made is likely to be around August 2024”
I knew it wouldnt be June, its just constant lies.
Richard Bagshaw says
There’s notes from court documents higher up the replies, it gives the timescale they have to follow after adjudication.
It’s obvious they aren’t obliged to do anything until adjudication has finished. The longer that goes on ….
The 14 mil, where’s the interest and did you all get your ring fenced payments back?
Dan says
I blame everyone who’s appealed their decisions! So you all held everyone else up 😂😂😂. Jokes!!
Before you know it we will get an email saying it’s gonna be less % aswell
Zoe says
“It is important for us to stress that NRF, as the Scheme Adjudicator, can communicate with ELL only, and cannot therefore respond to individual claimants or comment on any aspect of a claim. NRF cannot communicate directly with claimants.”
This above on the main page, of course they dont want anyone communicating with NRF, as they havent started the process yet… it is a shambles and its more deceit and lies. Sorry but I still feel this will collapse, they have no idea how many appeals will be upheld.
I have mentally said goodbye to any rebate. If however I do, then its a bonus.
John C says
Why would this collapse? The money is ringfenced, it can’t be accessed except as a pay-out. The % might change, but we don’t know how many claims had been upheld, or how many have gone to adjudication. It could be thousands, or could be a few hundred. So many variables that its impossible to second guess. I think there is a big hit to trust in NSF’s comments due to the amount of people told, that refunds would be in April, however the official communication in Jan report, did say this would be a challenge and may not be achieved. As also pointed out, the timescales for payment, are only on the basis of completion of all adjudication, that is still currently ongoing. I see no benefit to NSF to delay this any longer than they need to. They are an independent company, doing a job, that are no doubt getting a fixed sum to do it.
I do wonder if the August date has been given now as a way to cover their backs. Worst case scenario, if the adjudication is quicker then great, if not at least they don’t have to change date again. Also means that people stop ringing for an update. I would also presume that the money sat in a bank is earning interest, and would therefore be added to the pot for pay-out.
John C says
There also isn’t any guarantee that any of the appeals would be upheld, even if there are thousands. These claims have already been through a process and an appeal. I doubt the criteria has changed for the independent adjudication. Much like I would think the % of claims that change between a FOS adjudicator and FOS Ombudsman are probably quite small, though Sara might be closer to those numbers?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
A significant number of Amigo claims are being upheld on appeal. The difference with FOS is that the first stage of the FOS process the claim has been looked at by a human – with these schemes, the first stage seems to be mostly a computer decision.
John C says
Thats interesting Sara, thanks for the insight
J says
My claim wasn’t upheld and has gone to the adjudicator and apart from the fact I had relatively little evidence to provide, I feel my claim was about as valid as it could possibly get (shouldn’t have lent me the money in the first place at that stage in my life based off my existing credit history). I complained against several other debts and won in almost every case so I would be surprised if the adjudication doesn’t result in quite a high percentage of claims also being found in favour rather than rejected. It’s just a shame it’s only starting to be looked at now, utterly appalling.
Your_Old_Droog says
I agree. The wording of the 12th of April notice is concerning.
‘There has been a delay in the appeal adjudication process starting’ … meaning they haven’t even started processing the appeals yet!… and … ‘they will continue to assess on a rolling basis’ … meaning once they do actual start, whenever that may be, it could go on forever.
I haven’t appealed my claim, I have accepted whatever the outcome is and I am just patiently waiting.
However, according to my claim, I am due £2100 interest back and £700 compensation. Since we are only getting roughly 25 – 30 or so percent (unknown yet), I will only likely receive around £700 – £800 of this … which basically means that Everyday Loans get to keep all of the interest and this whole thing is really just a waste of time. They’ll just continue to do what they do out there on the high street.
Like you, I have said goodbye to this rebate. It’s just a bonus at this point if any amount ever comes.
Mags says
I got reply email from them deffo won’t be be before aug for any payout
Marc says
I wonder what will happen with claims that have been upheld for months in regard to the simple interest calculation calculated on top of the redress.
I was upheld last Aug ’23. But it’s been another 8 months since then, so what about the interest payment for those 8 months…
Marc says
I read my own Claim Resolution email again from when my loans where upheld. So, I’m answering my own question..
“plus compensatory interest at a rate of 8% per year on those payments (after the application of balance adjustments and any Ring-Fenced Account Payment) up to the Scheme Effective Date”
So to answer my own question. The compensation interest is calculated up until the start date of the scheme. I suppose awarding us more compensation interest at this stage would only serve to lower the final % we all receive
Zoe says
Worth mentioning I had two claims. One in 2019 which was upheld for £1290 for a £1000 loan . The second claim was 2021 when my credit had worsened even though my income had increased however was far more irresponsible and less checks made. This was £1500. Redress on this would be £2400. This claim was rejected. I appealed as made no sense.
I sincerely hope there is some money left at the end of this lengthy and confusing process. What makes things difficult is correspondence saying April payout then June. Now earliest August. They won’t know until all appeals are dealt with. I wonder if on the outcome the majority of appeals are upheld there is then indeed enough to payout.
I feel this will push on past the August as the terminology “earliest” give little hope. I also hope that even if the percentage payout drops there is some redress due. Bit hopes are dwindling due to the deliberate delays and the deliberate untrue information given so willingly.
I feel they have underestimated what will need to be paid out and there is a real chance the scheme could collapse. Sad to say this. But I have no faith after witnessing and hearing the mockery of replies and the samples of this process. I wish we all see something. But in my opinion highly unlikely.
Marc says
Scheme Supervisors report is out!
The estimated cash return for Scheme Creditors with eligible compensation claims is not expected to be lower than the prior forecast of 24%-31%
Next report within one month of 21st June.
62,233 claims (all received their first outcome).
1,061 claims (currently still waiting for adjudication. This is the number of claims that are delaying everything for 4 months!)
Everything else, we know already.
Zoe says
Am I correct that they have set “aside” 14 million? To pay out? If so 14million spread over 63k is only £222 per person. Many people’s redress will be far higher than this so I can’t see there is enough money to pay out.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Many people will be getting their redress mainly through reducing their outstanding balance. No cash being paid to them.
Marc says
63k is the number of claims, not the number of upheld claims…
Al says
New progress report on the NSF website. Confirming that the earliest date for redress is August however, the still do not expect the payout range to drop.
Tommy says
Surely this scheme is making interest so the returns should increase? I understand it may only be pennies per person but otherwise a company well known for profiteering mostly off of desperate people to the extent they have to do a scheme like this is now likely earning at least £10,000 a month in interest by delaying the scheme.
As long as there is no penaty for the delay and in fact they are likely earning money from delaying why would they put any effort into hitting the April deadline? From a business perpective I can’t blame them, from a moral perspective (something this company is clearly lacking) its very poor and there should be legislation or guidence to judges approving these schemes to prevent the consumer being let down every time.
Still, as people have said, before I received an email informing me I may have a claim I was expecting nothing so waiting a few more months for money I never knew was due to me in the first place is still a big bonus.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Interest earned will go to increase the final percentage payout a bit.
John C says
At least its now clear what is still outstanding. Less than 2% of claims are in an external adjudication process – 1,061/62,233 = 1.7%. Even if 100% of these are upheld, then that is likely built into the range of pay-out. We don’t know if these are £500 loans, or £10,000 loans I suppose, but they will no the value of them, so I can’t see how this is going to make a scheme collapse. Poorly communicated, yes, over promised on dates, certainly, but Grant Norton seem have followed the plan they laid out, have raised reports when they said they would and their staff are no doubt taking a bit of a bashing off claimants due to their mistakes.
As I said earlier, there is no reason to delay this any longer than absolutely needed, doubt Grant Norton will be getting paid more, and I would expect the interest earned, to be added to the avail money, if this is ring fenced. Always disappointing when you think you’ll be getting a lump of money soon and it doesn’t materialise. Especially for those it will make a huge difference too. Fingers crossed the 1k adjudications don’t take as long as expected. Think we need to switch off for a couple of months and see what the report in July brings and hopefully everyone gets what they were expecting
John C says
As a quick calculation
If £14m (the money avail) pays out at 24% then the total value of claims must be around £58.333m. If all 1,061 claims are upheld and lets say they are an average of £2.5k. This would add £2.625m to the claim pot, making it £60.986m. £14m would then be 22.9%. Even if every claim was £10k, the claim pot would be less than £70m and £14m would be around 20%
If my maths is wrong, someone let me know, but I hope that helps calm some of the panic.
zoe says
Thank yu for explaining this…. I am sure not all will be upheld, plus the 62k processed so far…. do we know how many of these have been upheld?
John C says
They haven’t said what % have been upheld, could be tiny. You can’t make a guess at how much money is avail without all the information. They currently think payment (based on 98.3% of claims done and dusted with no appeals process in place) will be 24-31%, and thats the only numbers we have seen. The calculation I used, based it on the lower end of the figure – 24%. I would hope based on everything that has been said, pay-out would be north of 20%. That is obviously dependent on the 24-31% expectation still being correct. If that isn’t true, then who knows, suppose we find out in August
P says
Sorry to be the bearer of bad news but I’ve just had an e-mail update advising earliest payouts will be August 2024 now
Leanne says
Was already spoke about on here last week when they updated the website.
I received the email today aswell and it does state that we have to check the bank details no later than 31st May so maybe they are still hoping for June but saying August just to cover their backs
AB says
I thought the same ! Here’s hoping !! Really random thing to put 3 months in advance as people may change accounts/ banks in that time. I’m remaining hopeful it will cone August but anytime before will be a bonus x
Richard Bagshaw says
I’m not sure they actually need to cover their backs, until that last appeal is checked they don’t have any legal obligation to follow any timeline.
I think the focus here needs not to be on the amount of percent or the time of payment but on how close they are to completing the final appeals.
Leanne says
We are in constant dialogue with the Scheme Adjudicator and are working to progress claims as promptly as possible.
This is wording from the email I received today.
From the report they put on their website only 1000 claims had been sent to the adjudicator so hopefully shouldn’t take too long
Marc says
Between the start of the scheme up to 24th Dec they had received 60820 claims and 55916 had been adjudicated. So, 92% completed at that point, leaving 4904 outstanding.
Since 24th Dec up to 16th April they’d received 62233 claims in total. This is now fixed as we’re passed the deadline. On the 16th Apr they had completed 61172 of those claims. That’s 98.3% completed. Leaving 1061 outstanding
Since the 16th Apr they have been working on the final 1061 outstanding claims (all of those are ‘appealed’ claims). If they say they will be paying out in Aug. Between the 16th Apr and 31st July there are 75 working days. So they will have to clear an average of 14 per working day in order to be ready for Aug.
Leanne says
I’m sure there will be more than one person working on the appeals so 14 a day should be manageable
Keith Henderson says
email received today I have been notified my claim has been upheld and the claim value is £2232.52
I borrowed £2600 and the total repaid was £5580
There is no other information so I have no idea of how much I will actually get.
Leanne says
They’ve said that we will receive 24-31% of the claim amount. The percentage won’t be confirmed until all claims have been checked
Daniel says
Keith, did you appeal your original descision, or were you just late to claim?
Keith says
I claimed last year when I got the email from them. No appeal so may of just been later to claim.
Daniel says
I’m surprised at the low % of cases referred to an adjudicator.
From some quick and dirty maths, and reading a few comments on here-
Average value of payout – £4500
At 24%, this is £1080
At 31%, this is £1395
With £14,000,000 being the total paid out, this equates to approx 13000 successful claims at the low end, or 10000 claims at the high end – that’s 1 in 6 claims being successful, yet only approx 1000 disputed it long enough to go to the adjudicator?!?
This doesn’t take into account payments made to the account during the claim period being paid back in full from a seperate escrow account – I simply don’t have enough data for that. But even if this was £3000 per person (doubtful, as some claims date back to 2008 from what I’ve seen) , that only reduces it to a 50/50 rate for successful claims.
It also doesn’t take into account that the people on here are more likely to have higher claims, as they are invested enough to post on a forum about it.
Please take the above with a huge grain of salt – lots of assumptions here.
Leanne says
As someone else said on this thread some of the claims won’t receive any money back as they will just have their loans written off with the money
Marc says
My personal belief is that it is likely that the % of successful claims would be at the lower end. I mean no disrespect to anyone, but if you’re given a ‘CLAIM’ button to hit without having to put any further effort into it, I think the most likely behaviour would be for people to hit the button with the attitude of ‘Nothing ventured, nothing gained’.
But when the claim isn’t upheld and further evidence is required in order to appeal the numbers drop down to those people who genuinely feel like it’s worth taking further and investing their time into.
That’s just my opinion.
Zoe says
My claim was upheld. However if you look at other schemes. Amigo for example a very high number of those that appealed were successful. In any case even if all are successful there is enough money set aside. They are just waiting to see how many so they can work out what the percent will be. As above states asking for bank details no later than end of May, means hopefully it’ll be a June payout after all. Who knows, the August could also be delayed. Nothing so far has gone to plan. So I have mentally said goodbye to this and if and when it happens for me it’ll be a bonus. But I dont think anyone should rely on this.
Mr Craig Anderson-Jones says
I’m treating it the same way. I was surprised when it first happened but as I never knew about it, any money I get is just a bonus but I’m certainly not expecting or planning on it
Teddy Ruxpin says
I’ve wrote to them asking for confirmation of the number currently upheld….
Speaking from personal experience both as client and for an adjudicator (PWC) you would only be allocated so many hours per day for a “project” that has no deadline.
As there is no date stipulated by the courts, an adjudicator would prioritise their day to day busines and date specific workload first.
I worked on 5 projects similar to schemes over a course of 4 years. Each one of these we had a team of 6 working less than 6hrs a week, as we had our own work to do.
Some appeals were straightforward and cleared but the more tedious where your reliant on the business (Everyday) / client (you) to supply evidence makes the process drawn out.
You have to remember that an adjudicator doesn’t get paid by the hour – it’s a specific fee that may include a completion bonus. Plus the business (Everyday) aren’t bound by any timeframes either