When you get a payday loan, it arrives very quickly… so why does it take some payday lenders so long to pay out refunds for unaffordable lending? Especially as a few lenders are very fast?
Thousands of people have left comments on the main How to get a payday loan refund page on the progress of their claims.
This article summarises recent comments about the large and mid-sized lenders, looking at:
- how long lenders take to reply to your complaint
- whether they include 8% statutory interest
- and, when a refund is agreed, how long it takes for a refund to be paid.
It also gives an indication as to whether it is worth trying to negotiate when a lender has rejected or made an offer which is too low… You should always go back to the lender if there is a fundamental error e.g. they have the wrong number of loans.
But is it worth bothering if they have just made the wrong decision? For many lenders, you are just wasting time and mental energy as the lender doesn’t listen – send your complaint to the Finacial Ombudsman (FOS) straight away.
Contents
Don’t forget…
Your case is an individual one. You may get a good result quickly from a lender who has a reputation for being difficult. Or you may have a good case rejected by a lender that other people have found fair to deal with – that doesn’t mean you are wrong and it’s a bad case. The ombudsman is agreeing with customer complaints in 68% of payday loan cases!
So seeing what has happened to other people is interesting but it doesn’t really help you decide what you should do. The main payday loan refund page describes the whole process, including if you should take a case to the Ombudsman and how to do it. That page is the best place to ask questions… and also to say how your case is going!
The big three payday lenders
Wonga
With Wonga now in administration, you can no longer make a claim to them. See Wonga refunds after administration – latest news for up to date information if you have already submitted a claim.
Quick Quid refunds ( & their other brands, Pounds To Pocket and On Stride)
Also see separate article about Quick Quid complaints.
Some PTP and OnStride loans are very large. If you have these, you can win a 1 or 2 loan case at the FOS – the usual guideline that 1 or 2 loans cases are very hard to win doesn’t apply to these big loans.
They usually ask you to send payslips and bank statements. You don’t have to if you don’t want to – just tell them to consider your complaint as it stands and that you will supply more information to the Ombudsman. I haven’t seen any sign that they actually pay attention to anything you send them.
In mid 2019 their offers are rather better, they now sometimes include loans over 6 years old and don’t automatically reject all complaints about loans since 2015. but the offers are sometimes a lot lower than you could get from going to FOS.
Response time – in the last of the 8 weeks normally.
Worth negotiating? No.
Do they add 8% statutory interest? Yes.
Do they accept adjudicator offers? Sometimes. Sometimes they reject. Sometimes they make a lower offer – in these cases the Ombudsman almost always upholds what the adjudicator said.
In summer 2019, they accepted several thousand adjudicator decisions they had previously rejected.
Payout timescales – The decision to refund thousands of people in August has caused a logjam in the payout process. They used to be fast. Now they aren’t!
Payday UK, Payday Express and the Money Shop
In July 2019, Instant Cash Loans, that owns all these three brands, announce it was closing and setting up a Scheme of Arrangement to limit the refunds to it has to pay. See Money Shop to close – the implications for refunds for its 2 million customers.
The mid-sized payday lenders
Lending Stream refunds
Lending Stream is so bad at complaint handling that I’ve written a separate article: Lending Stream’s poor and slow complaint handling. The only good thing is that people are getting large refunds in the end via the Finacial Ombudsman.
Response time – They often respond fairly quickly by rejecting the complaint. Many people are told they had what sounds like an absurdly high credit score so ignore this. Sometimes they don’t say this is their final response, and if you ask if it is, they don’t reply – in this case, send to the Ombudsman at 8 weeks.
Worth negotiating? No. I don’t think they read anything you send them.
Do they add 8% statutory interest? No.
Do they accept adjudicator offers? They often do but sometimes they are very slow, if they go beyond the time the adjudicator set, leaving a bad Trust Pilot review sometimes speeds things up!
Payout timescales – Very slow. they say 28 days, then they take a few weeks to verify your bank details and announce the 28 days starts from that point. Tell your adjudicator if this happens. In summer 2019 some readers reported they were blaming Brexit!
Also check the numbers on their calculated refunds – sometimes they get the interest and charges to be refunded wrong. Weirdly it always seems to be less than you should get, not more…
Mr Lender refunds
Response time – usually in the first few weeks. Often they send a template reply to you complaining that you have sent them a template complaint! If you get this, just reply that your complaint started on dd/mm/yy and if they don’t respond in 8 weeks you will be sending it to the Financial Ombudsman.
Worth negotiating? Definitely. They seem keen to reach a sensible settlement directly, so if you think extra loans should be included, argue your case.
They also get upset if you post a bad Trust Pilot review and try to resolve the issue with you.
Do they add 8% statutory interest? No, but people are often happy to settle without this.
Payout timescales – a few days.
Myjar refunds
Some Myjar loans are very large. If you have these, you can win a 1 or 2 loan case at the FOS – the usual guideline that 1 or 2 loans cases are very hard to win doesn’t apply to these big loans.
They usually ask for bank statements and payslips. Forget about payslips – pointless. I’m not sure they read the bank statements, but if you don’t have them this is a good time to get them so you have them ready to go to the Ombudsman. If you only had a few large loans it’s more important to send bank statements.
They used to refuse to pay on loans over 6 years old. But in summer 2019 they have written to some people who accepted a settlement on loans under 6 years old with an additional refund for the older loans.
Response time – replies used to be in the 8th week but in late 2018 they started asking for an extra 2 weeks (10 working days) at the end of 8 weeks.
Worth negotiating? They seem to have an automated decision process that does NOT follow what the Ombudsman would do, so you may get made an offer on a lot fewer loans than you should. Some people have had success at getting one or two extra loans included in the refund, but if you don’t get an answer within a week send the case to FOS as you will probably get a lot more that way.
Do they add 8% statutory interest? Yes usually. If you didn’t specifically ask for it in your complaint, go back to them and they will add it.
Do they accept adjudicator offers? Often, but they can be slow if they go beyond the time the adjudicator set, leave them a bad Trust Pilot review, it sometimes speeds things up!
Payout timescales – erratic.
Peachy refunds
They often ask for bank statements and payslips. Forget about payslips – pointless. I’m not sure they read the bank statements, but if you don’t have them this is a good time to get them so you have them ready to go to the Ombudsman.
Response time – usually reply in the first four weeks.
They often make an offer quickly. It’s often the first you will get if you are making several complaints and some people say Yes then later realise it wasn’t a good one… so ask on How to get a payday loan refund if you aren’t sure how good it is.
Worth negotiating? Some people have had additional loans included in a refund when the first offer was too low but you may have to push hard with several emails describing your situation.
Do they add 8% statutory interest? No. But if you go back and say you will accept their offer if they add it, they sometimes do. And sometimes they say they will if you send banks statements – a bizarre waste of everyone’s time.
Payout timescales – 14 days.
Safetynet Credit refunds
Response time – Whilst you are waiting, make sure you have cancelled the CPA with your bank as SNC have a bad habit of waiting 30 days then collecting all the money, even though the complaint is still ongoing. Usually reply in 7th or 8th week but some people get quicker responses.
Worth negotiating? No. They often make a good offer but it’s not reliable. I can’t predict who will get a good result easily and who will have to go to FOS.
Ignore their lengthy comments that they are not a payday lender, that you are just using a template letter (so what? they are using template replies!), that they credit checked you (they may have done but then ignored it!), that your income was fine (haha). They should have seen from your bank statements that you were reliant on borrowing from them – send the case to FOS.
Payout timescales – fast.
Satsuma refunds
Some Satsuma loans are very large. If you have these, you can win a 1 or 2 loan case at the FOS – the usual guideline that 1 or 2 loans cases are very hard to win doesn’t apply to these big loans.
Response time – they are incredibly slow, often asking for more weeks. As they don’t often make a good offer, I suggest sending your complaint straight to the Ombudsman at the 8 week point.
Worth negotiating? No.
At the ombudsman: again they are very slow to send the case file over and to reply to adjudicator decisions.
Payout timescales – it used to be 28 days, now some readers are reporting quicker.
Sunny refunds
Sunny now have an automated decision-making program that appears to refuse to refund any loan in the first year and after the first year if there is a break fo more than a couple of months they stop refunding there. This is NOT what the Ombudsman does. Most people could get MUCH better offers by going to FOS.
Response time – usually in the 7th or 8th week.
Worth negotiating? No. Only exception if the refund offered is OK but they haven’t mentioned deleting the credit card record – if this is important to you it’s worth asking them to do this rather than have the case go to the Ombudsman.
Accept adjudicator decision? Sunny are very slow to reply to the adjudicator, often reject complaints and sometimes come back with lower offers. Leave them a bad review on Trust Pilot if they don’t reply to the adjudicator in time or reject a case with a lot of loans.
Payout timescales – 30 days, sometimes plus a few more :( Leaving bad reviews on Trust Pilot sometimes speeds things up a bit.
Uncle Buck refunds
They normally ask people to supply a credit report and bank statements. I suggest not doing this as they rarely make good offers and can be unpleasant. Tell them to consider the complaint on the basis of what they know.
They use a template reply which sometimes gives bizarre results eg saying a gap between two loans of less than a month is a long time. In general their offers are often poor, FOS cases seem to be going through quickly so send a poor offer or a rejection straight to the Ombudsman!
Response time – in the last few days of the 8 weeks.
Worth negotiating? No. They won’t move and this is definitely not a lender you want to talk to.
Trust Pilot reviews: If UB is ignoring a decision by an adjudicator so you are told it has to wait for an ombudsman, trying leaving them a very bad review on Trust Pilot. This has worked for several readers.
Payout timescales – it used to be 28 days, now some readers are reporting less than a week.
Wageday Advance refunds
Wageday Advance went into administration in February 2019. What happened previously with refunds from them is no longer relevant. See Wagdeday Advance refunds after administration for the latest news.
247 Moneybox refunds
Response time – 247 Moneybox now seems to often ask people quickly what they would see as a suitable settlement. This is your chance to propose a compromise you would be happy with. If you just say you want a full refund, then that’s fine, but it’s not going to speed things up. If you had say 12 loans and the first 3 were all small, you could be realistic and reply that in the interests of a quick speedy settlement you would accept a refund on loans 4-12 but if the case goes to FOS you will be asking for a full refund.
Send cases straight to the ombudsman at 8 weeks if they haven’t replied. They are also slow to send the case details to the adjudicator and sometimes ignore an adjudicator’s decision.
Worth negotiating? Possibly. Some people have succeeded saying they will accept the offer if it is changed to include 8% statutory interest. But they may ignore your emails. But some people have had an offer after they have told Moneybox 247 that the complaint has been sent to the Ombudsman.
Payout timescales – They were very slow, sometimes not paying out within the allowed 28 days after an Ombudsman decision. Also they sometimes don’t correct people’s credit record as they agreed to, so make sure you check your to see that it has been done.
MORE RESOURCES
There are a LOT of articles about payday loans refunds on this site. If you have one of the following situations, read up about it:
- Refunds where you still owe some money – some write-off offers are not nearly as good as they look!
- Payday lender says I lied
- How gambling affects payday loan complaints
- Ombudsman can look at loans over 6 years old
- Some reasons payday loan complaints are rejected by the ombudsman.
Andrew says
When the Ombudsman emails to advise they have emailed the company how long does the company usually take to respond? Are there different timescales? I have provided everything from when I complained so don’t know what would take them so long to respond back to.
Alex7824 says
To be honest with you they were very good with my case. I did not ha to go to fos and although they requested my bank statements they upheld the case on my favour. 6 loans. They paid me back all interest plus 8%. They have written off the outstanding balance
SHEILA MARSHALL says
I have received emails stating how much I could be entitled to back but then it states that it will only be about 4.5-5% of that which is absolute peanuts. All the hassle that goes with claiming makes me wonder if it was all worth it. Can they do this or is it a co out?
Andrew says
Does anyone know how long Lending Stream take after the Ombudsman has gone back to advise them what should be refunded? Ombudsman has given them until 22nd, will they likely take until then to respond or are they ok at coming back?
Adz says
Well the Ombudsman accepted for me on the 30th July, I’ve just got my refund today so not quick, anything to drag their heals they will
Andrew says
That’s terrible how do they get away with that? I was hoping now the Ombudsman has told them what is to be done would be weeks not months.
Lena says
I have an outstanding loan with Safetynet Credit who have responded upholding my complaint (quickly) with an offer to refund ALL interest + statutory interest which seemed decent until I looked at the figures against my bank statements. I assumed that if I borrowed (example) £1000 and over time repaid them £1500 (including interest) that meant I paid £500 in interest. However their offer is below what I expected and they say my assumption isn’t correct:-
“The figures provided to you are correct. Please be aware that the figures that you have provided us are the total amount of repayments you have made and not interest repaid. With each repayment, the amount taken is divided into principal and interest and applied towards your balance proportionality.”
I borrowed £4126.00 in total across 18 months and repaid £6409.07 so what am I supposed to think the £2283.-7 difference is if it’s not interest? They are only offering my £780 as an interest refund and so this feels like a scam but the way they have laid out the figures is confusing and it’s a html so I can’t check their figures. I don’t want to risk anything by sending it tot he Ombudsman if I’m completely wrong.
Lena says
They also haven’t listed some of the repayments that I made which add up to a few hundred pounds.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Are they offering £780 plus wiping the outstanding balance? How large is this balance?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
and how much do the missing payments add up to?
Lena says
Hi Sara,
Firstly, thank you so much for helping. Here are the figures on my statement then below what they are proposing.
SNC offer:
Outstanding balance: £1162.40
Offer to redress all interest: £737.33
Offer to redress stat interest @ 8%: £475.98
HMRC deduction of 20%: £9.60
Removal of interest accrued on outstanding balance: £195.67
TOTAL REMAINING TO BE PAID £195.67 (it doesn’t quite add up but it will do)
However, if you compare that to my bank statements where I borrowed £4126.00 and repaid £6409 back over the course of borrowing, I worked out I would be entitled to interest of the difference (£2283.00). They have upheld my complaint so figured if I went to the FoS it would be a simple case of bad maths.
Emma says
Anyone had any luck with mr lender. There saying not taking any more complaints now
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Where did they say this?
Felicity says
It isn’t saying anything about this under the Complaints section of their website. And I don’t believe any trading company can legitimately say something like that – a matter for the OFT if nothing else. If they have said that to you on the phone/by email, you should challenge it.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
I think this must have been some sort of misunderstanding.
Marty says
Has anybody had any joy at with Uncle Buck I am now 34 months into my complaint, they object all the way and am still with a FOS adjudicator it is absolutely disgusting something can drag on this long with no end in sight.
Felicity Manduca says
Hello Marty – I got money back from Uncle Buck – initially they declined my affordability complaint, but when I replied saying I disagreed and that I would go to the FOS (also mentioned they were in breach of GDPR as they claimed not to have my records, when though my account was still open in 2014), got a quick response back saying I had been sent the initial email in error and that someone was looking at my case. I then got a phone call with an offer – on the last loan before I had entered a DMP – which I had rolled over 4 times – I also asked them to add the 8% statutory interest, which they did – and I accepted – an amount just over £200 – which was better than hassling for any more as I sensed I wouldn’t get anywhere. They said they would pay within 7 working days once I signed the Settlement form, but I had to chase for payment on day 8 – they apologised and arranged payment to my bank that day.
Marty says
Hi Felicity thanks for responding I am glad to read you got some success.
My case is so bad its bordering comedy gold. They once rejected my complaint when contacted by the FOS had the audacity to say my complaint was frivolous and vexatious…..this despite dealing with me and sending a statement of my account and rejecting my complaint.
They object every step of the way and I’ve dealt with loads of places however this is by far the worst I’m now waiting more time for jurisdiction issues which FOS say can take several more months this is 34 months now
Felicity says
I’m so sorry to hear you’ve had such a bad experience Marty and it sounds as though this has gone on for far too long. If it’s for a substantial amount, my advice would be to stick with it and continue to pester UB, and also speak to the FOS adjudicator about your options given this is still unresolved. At the end of the day though, you have to ask yourself, is it worth all the time/effort this is taking and can you say for certain that you will be awarded a decent amount of money when it has been resolved? I wish you luck either way, fingers firmly crossed for you.
parm says
Hi, MYJAR cannot find my loan record from when they were TxtLoan, the say they only keep records for 5 years, anyone else had this problem, I only became aware of payday refunds very recently.
This is their letter;
Upon reviewing the information, you have provided and checking our system records, we have been unable to locate an account for you.
We would like to inform you that, MYJAR will only hold customers’ personal data for as long as is necessary; for internal accounting purposes, to continue to provide a
service to her clients, to meet our legal obligations under applicable UK data protection rules and the General Data Protection Regulation, and in accordance with
applicable anti-money laundering legislation.
Furthermore, loan transactional data are held for only five years, in accordance with our Data Retention Policy. Therefore, data related to loan history that is older than
five years may be subject to deletion.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Do you have evidence from your bank statements about these loans?
Felicity says
Hello Sara,
Any advice on Response Funding? I complained to them about the loans I had when they traded as Fancy a Payday – they rejected the complaint, so I challenged this, as I have a good case for redress (would not complain if I didn’t). I got a standard email in reply the other day to say they have stopped trading and are no longer FCA regulated, and on checking their website, they are now calling themselves Response Loans, acting as a broker only. Parent company is Total Home Loans Direct Ltd – worth taking up with them? Grrrrr