Did your payday loans cost so much when you repaid one you had to keep on borrowing?
You can get a refund of the interest you paid on unaffordable loans.
It’s easy to ask for a payday loan refund using the free template letters here. The letters work if your payday loans were repaid or you still owe money.
The comments below this article have thousands of stories of the refunds people have got using these letters. It is a great place to ask questions!
Contents
What are “unaffordable” loans?
Was a loan affordable just because you repaid it?
No! If paying a loan left you so broke you had to borrow again – from the same lender or a different one – it was unaffordable!
The regulator says:
“the borrower should be able to make the required repayments without undue difficulty, whilst continuing to meet other debt repayment obligations and reasonable regular outgoings.”
That means a payday loan is only affordable if you repaid it on time and you could still manage to pay your other bills and debts.
Payday loans are meant to solve a short-term problem. If you kept repaying one then getting another loan soon after, the lender should have stopped lending to you.
If the loan was small and it was the first loan or second loan from a lender, the lender may not have realised the loan was unaffordable for you. But it was irresponsible lending to just carry on giving you more loans.
Many lenders ignore obvious signs of problems such as your loans increasing in size, or borrowing again soon after repayment.
How much compensation can you get?
You don’t have to calculate this. Just ask for a refund from the lender and see what you are offered. This is simple and it works well.
The Financial Ombudsman has seen tens of thousands of payday loan affordability complaints.
A typical decision by the Ombudsman is that the payday lender should refund all the interest you paid interest after the third, fourth or fifth loan.
But if your first loan was large, or was rolled over several times you could get a refund from just one loan.
Which lenders can you get refunds from?
You can complain to lenders that are still in business, even if they are no longer lending. These include:
Lending Stream, Cash Converters, CashASAP, Drafty, Dot Dot, Fast Loan Uk, Fernovo, Fund Ourselves, Kabayan, LoanPig, Mr Lender, Moneyboat, MyKredit, My Finance Club, QuidMarket, Savvy, The Money Platform, WageMe, Wizzcash,
See this email list for payday lenders for a longer list and all the contact details to use.
If the lender has gone into administration, including CashForUNow, Piggybank, Ferratum, Oakam, Safetynet Credit, Tappily:
- make a claim to the administrators – there is normally a simple form for you to complete, see the lender’s website for details – but there will be a time limit for doing this.
- you may not get much cash back but this is very easy to do. A balance may be reduced or cleared even if there is no cash to distribute. And if you win the complaint any negative marks on your credit record will be removed.
It is probably too late to make claims to other lenders who gave up years ago, see this list.
For longer-term loans there are better template letters to use on other pages:
- doorstep lenders and guarantor lenders,
- Loans2Go – the worst loans in Britain!
- 118 Money, Likely Loans, Bamboo, car finance, bank loans and other long-term loans.
Do this before, before you send in a complaint
Doing these things now will make your life easier later.
Get a copy of your TransUnion statutory credit report and keep it. After complaints are started, sometimes loans are deleted and you may want the full report if you later have to go to the Ombudsman.
If you still owe money to the lender, read Will an affordability claim hurt my credit record, and other questions. These looks at your options for stopping paying, the effect on your credit record etc.
If the rest of your finances are difficult, look into a Debt Management Plan (DMP) where you make one affordable payment a month to StepChange. This gets you into a safe financial position as these affordability complaints can take a long time to go through at the Ombudsman. Winning a complaint then speeds up the DMP.
Unless you can afford to make this month’s payment without borrowing again, cancel the CPA to the lender at your bank. Otherwise the lender may take the money and you will be in a mess.
If your loan was sold to a debt collector you complain to the original lender. But also tell the debt collector that you are disputing the debt. It is a good idea to carry on making payments to the debt collector if they are affordable.
Start your complaint & get loan details
Find the lender’s email address for complaints from this list.
Put “AFFORDABILITY COMPLAINT” as the subject of your email:
You should never have given me these unaffordable loans. Paying you each month left me with too little money so I had to keep borrowing to get through the next month.
You should have realised from the number of times I borrowed that my debt problems were getting worse. It was not responsible to continue to lend to me. [Add more details eg how often you borrowed or rolled loans if you know them, how the amount borrowed generally went up etc]
[Include/change this if your credit record would have shown big problems:] My credit reports would have shown all my other debts and problems including late payments/defaults /CCJs/debt management.]
I am asking you to refund the interest and any charges I paid, plus statutory interest, and to delete any negative information from my credit record.
[delete this sentence if you know what all your loans were.] I know the difficulties your loans have caused me but I no longer have all the loan details. Please send me a list, showing for each loan when it was taken out, how much interest and charges you added, and what I repaid. This will enable me to assess any refund you offer me.
[delete this sentence if none of your loans were sold.]If a loan was later sold to a debt collector, please inform me of the date of sale and the name of the debt collector.
Some ways to improve this
Add any other points that help you describe what happened to you. You don’t need to list the loans – the lenders knows them.
Some examples:
- “I took out another loan with xxxx to pay you.”
- “Sometimes I borrowed to pay the rent and then had to top-up to get money for food.”
- if you weren’t treated fairly while you were borrowing or when you could not make a payment, add a bit about this.
You can attach bank statements if you like, This is a good idea as these show how unaffordable the loans were for you. If you have gambling showing, this helps your complaint, it doesn’t harm it.
I don’t know if many lenders actually read what you send them. I
it’s easy to make these complaints – you don’t need to calculate what refund you should get or quote laws.
Only one loan?
The template refers to multiple loans because that is what normally happens with payday lenders.
When you only had one loan and it was large, read Refunds from large loans and use the template there.
If you only had one loan and it was small, this is going to be a very difficult complaint to win. If you have borrowed once or twice from 5 leaders, that is much more difficult to win an affordability complaint than having 4 or 5 loans from two lenders.
Waiting for a reply from the lender
This email starts your affordability complaint.
They may send the list of loans first and later respond to your complaint. So don’t be surprised if you get sent info on the loans but nothing about your request for a refund.
When you get your loan information, you can send in more details about your complaint if you want. You don’t have to do this, your complaint has already begun and the lender has to reply.
The lender should reply to your complaint within 8 weeks from when you send the email, not when they acknowledge it. Make a note in your diary for 8 weeks time and chase the lender up if you don’t get a reply.
Don’t be surprised if you have to wait until the end of the 8 weeks to get response – this is common.
Send your bank statements or other information?
Some lenders ask you to send them a copy of your credit record, payslips or bank statements.
Credit record – the lender can check your credit record themselves if they want. But you should download a copy of your credit record asap as the Ombudsman will ask for it. Don’t put this off, the sooner you get a report downloaded, the further back it goes which is good.
Don’t send payslips – they won’t help an affordability complaint and the ombudsman never asks for them.
It is a good idea to send bank statements. But think twice about the cost of copying and postage if there are a lot. Some lenders seem to ignore them if you do send them.
Again this is a good point to get those bank statements even if you do not want to send them as they will help an Ombudsman claim a lot. You can get them going back at least 6 years even if the account has been closed.
Lender says No or makes a poor offer
If the lender rejects your complaint or offers you a small amount, don’t be depressed. You may still have a very good case!
It is easy and free to send your case to the Financial Ombudsman where many thousands of people have won their payday loan complaints, despite being rejected by the lender.
Give up?
Some lenders try to make your case sound bad when it isn’t. People have had large amounts refunded after a complete rejection!
Just ignore any of the following comments, they do not mean you have a weak case:
- they relied on your loan applications and you didn’t give accurate facts – see Lender says I lied for more about this;
- you repaid some loans early – this doesn’t prove the loans were affordable, just that you were trying to save interest;
- your borrowing didn’t go up every time – irrelevant, what matters is that you kept borrowing;
- you had a good enough credit score or they didn’t legally have to check your credit record – if you only had one or two small loans that is true. But if the loans were large or you kept borrowing, they should have looked more closely;
- your loans are over 6 years old – the Ombudsman will look at these even if the lender says they won’t!
A good enough case to go to the Ombudsman?
If you don’t know what to do, ask in the comments below this article. Accepting an offer settles your whole complaint – you can’t change your mind later.
Don’t worry that you will lose a small offer by going to the Ombudsman – this doesn’t happen.
Some points to think about:
- if you are offered a refund on only a few loans, don’t accept it if you think the lender should have realised a lot of the other loans were unaffordable;
- an offer to write off your current balance may sound convenient … but it may be very poor if you should get a refund as well;
- if getting defaults or late payments removed from your credit record is important to you, are you happy with what the lender is proposing to do? Don’t assume your credit record will be cleared if the lender didn’t mention this.
One or two loan cases are hard to win at the Ombudsman. It’s probably best to give up on one or two loan cases unless:
- the loan was large. Here is one single loan case that was won even though it was an installment loan and the borrower had a good income. And another single loan case for a loan of £1,000. You can win cases for smaller amounts if the repayment would have been a large amount of your income; or
- you still owe money.
Don’t delay too long – there is a 6-month time limit after a lender rejects your complaint to send the case to the ombudsman. When you aren’t sure, send the complaint to FOS. This is easy to do – let FOS make the decision.
How to send a complaint to FOS
Put in a separate complaint about each lender.
Don’t wait until all your lenders have replied before sending the first one to the Ombudsman!
FOS’s “complain online” option is easy and takes you through your complaint step by step.
You can just copy what you said in your complaint to the lender. You can add more details, for example, if you disagree with what the lender replied to you.
If some of your loans were over 6 years ago, tell the Ombudsman when and how you found out about these complaints. For example:
“I knew the loans were causing me difficulty in 2016, but I thought this was my fault for being bad with money. I didn’t find out that the lender should have checked the loans were affordable until June 2022 when my brother told me about these claims/I saw an advert from a claims company on Facebook/I read an article about these claims” – change this so it is right for your case!
Things to attach:
- the reply you have had from the lender.
- bank statements if you have them. Ideally from 3 months before your first loan until the last loan was repaid or you defaulted on it. This strengthens your case, showing how unaffordable the loans were. You can still get bank statements even if your account is closed – if you don’t have them, start the process of getting them now, don’t wait until FOS asks for them.
- a copy of your TransUnion Statutory credit report
- a copy of the credit agreements for the loans if you have them. If you don’t, don’t worry, FOS will get them from the lender.
What happens after you have sent a case to FOS
You will normally be contacted within a couple of weeks and asked for a copy of your credit record and your bank statements if you haven’t sent these. If you have sent these on one complaint, then when you complain about a different lender they will use the ones they already have.
After this initial contact, your case will wait for the lender to send FOS your case file and then wait to be picked up by an adjudicator who will make a decision on it.
If you are still making payments to the lender, tell the lender you want to reduce these to an affordable amount. This will make waiting for an Ombudsman decision much less stressful for you.
The Financial Ombudsman has a two-stage process. Most cases are settled by the first “adjudicator” stage but about 10% go to the second “Ombudsman” stage.
A few problem cases
Don’t ask for a refund:
- if you are bankrupt now or have been bankrupt in the past – any refund would go to the Official Receiver.
- if you are in an IVA, as refunds will go to your IVA firm not to you. If your IVA has finished the refund may still be sent to your old IVA firm.
- if you are in a DRO now, getting a refund may mean your DRO is cancelled!
More help
You can ask a question in the comments below – you may get a reply from someone who has been in your exact situation.
Don’t use a claims management company. They are expensive and often incompetent. It’s easy to do this yourself and you can ask questions below and get replies from other readers who have done this.
Card & catalogue affordability complaints
Can you get an overdraft refund?
Could a Debt Relief Order help you?
Shaun says
Hi there,
Firstly, thank you for all the advice detailed on this page.
Just a quick question. Along with the refund, will the payday loans company remove the debt from the CRA’s?
I have a current debt with Smart-pig that they have reported to Transunion. I am in the process for asking for a refund/removal of the default from my credit file.
Regards
Shaun
Sara (Debt Camel) says
how many previous debts did you have from them?
Shaun Silva says
I took out 5 loans from them (£1200 in total interest)- one of which I defaulted on. I took out all the loans whilst I had a gambling addiction- and whilst I was at university (full time study)
Since the loan was taken out in 2017, they have now sold that debt onto Westcott. Prior to reading this, I offered to pay the debt in full on the basis that they would remove the default from my credit file. They refused to do so- so the one debt is still outstanding.
Also, I noticed that clearscore haven’t picked up the default- does this mean that banks etc who do not use TransUnion do not pick up the default from smartpig?
Thanks again for all your help. This really is a great website!
Sara (Debt Camel) says
If Smartpig agree with your complaint, they should remove the interest from the balance and delete the default from the record. If they don’t, send the complaint to the Financial Ombudsman.
Shaun Silva says
Hi there,
If the debt has been sold onto another company- do I send the template email to them?
Thanks
Shaun
Sara (Debt Camel) says
No, you complain to the original lender.
ricky says
can someone assist, i am trying to get my credit score sorted, i fell into the payday loan trap a few years back but i’m getting into the clear now.
I have MMP Financial on my credit report with an outstanding balance, but they have gone into administration.
A: who do i pay?
B: how do i get the balance removed from my credit file if there is no contact?
Thanks
Ricky
AB says
My partner has also had this same distress of delayed then no redress from Myjar. This was after long delays and falsely claiming they had already paid my partner on 8th December.
It was interesting looking at their companies house record. Missing February 2019 accounts that were due November 2019 and yet still taking loans up until just before administration.
Maybe the charge agreement with their Jersey treasury company that gave that company first secured claim on the whole loan book and other assets was why they were happy to go on lending knowing they were in a hole.
Sadly, I don’t think the administrators and FCA will sort that properly as that is illegal. Surely that charge should be unwound and maybe a charge of insolvent/false trading pursued on the directors. At least then there would be a real proportion of cash for those who owed it.
Tom says
Hi Sara,
Is there anybody other than the FOS that I can complain to about Satsuma?! Such as the FCA?
I think their timescales for handling my complaint are completely unreasonable.
The background is that I had two loans both of which were in default. I complained in May, with an offer of settlement in exchange for writing off the balances and removing the defaults. (I had paid more than the principal on one, and was about £80 off having paid the principal on the other, so offered £100 to bring the matter to a close.) My offer was roundly rejected!
The FOS upheld my complaint which Satsuma accepted – and meant they owed me a refund. Despite this, their debt collectors (acting on S’s behalf – they didn’t sell the debt) go on chasing me. Both I and the FOS have asked S to tell them to stop yet still they chase.
Satsuma finally wrote to me on 8 December – despite the FOS’ findings on 2 October. In their letter, they say they need 60 working days to update my credit file.
It seems completely unreasonable to me that a firm can take what will in practice be six months (2 October to late March) to remove the defaults from my credit file given they been found to have acted improperly, and accepted the same. As you’ll appreciate, the defaults are causing me great difficulty. Coupled with the continued chasing for money I don’t owe, it’s not acceptable.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
So when did Satsuma accept the FOS decision?
And has the debt collector stopped chasing you?
Tom says
They accepted it on Nov 9th.
The debt collector was still chasing me in late December.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
I see why you are upset. But this is only 3 weeks after Satsuma accepted the decision.
If you get further contact from the debt collector in January come back here.
Lianne says
Hi,
Anyone facing issues with Satsuma Loans (Provident) my case was assigned back in April, my adjudicator has been chasing for information from Satsuma since then with no reply.
8 months later this is still going on and I am getting fed up with it.
Yes I appreciate we are facing tough times but surely there has to be a specific deadline for them to provide this information, it isn’t fair.
Adjudicator has said the central team are chasing for the information.
Thanks
Lianne
Sara (Debt Camel) says
do you know what the information they want is? I assume Satsuma have at least provided their case file?
Carol H says
Hi,
I’ve had a rejection reply from Mykredit for the 4 loans I had with them, but the email doesn’t say I have a right to take to an appeal?
Holly D says
Hi Sara,
After my affordability complaint was rejected by Satsuma, my complaint was allocated to an FOS adjudicator who, after a few months waiting received a partial case file from Satsuma. On the 15 December, the adjudicator informed me that he was ‘still waiting on vital information’ from the business and, that he was ‘working with the business to try and get the information as quickly as possible’ !!
I have lost out heavily (c £8,000 to Wonga and Sunny.) Do you know of any way to speed up this process with Satsuma,
Many thanks for any advice.
Best wishes for a safe and prosperous 2021
Holly D says
Hi Sara,
I missed out the most important part of yesterday’s post, my complaint against Satsuma was allocated to an adjudicator on 14th MARCH, nearly EIGHT MONTHS AGO, and he still does not have all the information that he requires to consider my complaint.
Holly D
Sara (Debt Camel) says
I suggest you email the FCA at consumer.queries@fca.org.uk and copy this to joe.sweeney@provident.co.uk and Neil.Iveson@provident.co.uk
Subject: Satsuma (Provident – 700144) hasn’t sent FOS my case file after [x] months
Put in a few short detail about your complaint – how many loans you had, Satsuma’s rejection and the date you sent the case to FOS.
Say FOS they asked Satsuma for your case record [x] months ago but they only sent a partial file. Your adjudicator has asked for the further details but after [x] months these have still not been provided which is preventing FOS from making a decision on your case.
Say you know the FCA will not look at your individual case but you thought the FCA should know how slow Satsuma’s complaint handling.
Holly D says
Thank you Sara
Best wishes
Liz says
Has anyone had their Swift Sterling redress yet?
Lucy says
Hello,
This is great advice thank you but I’m looking for a slightly different template. I was able to borrow £6k from a lender when I was in massive financial difficulty a few years ago and had multiple loans from different companies. The above template doesn’t quite work for me and I only borrow from them once but they definitely shouldn’t have let me have the loan. There were no financial checks or even a conversation with a human, the money just appeared in my account after completing the form.
I’d really appreciate any advise you have to order, thank you!
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Use the different template over here: https://debtcamel.co.uk/refunds-large-high-cost-loans/
Hugo says
Hi Sara
I seem to recall that you have previously referenced, on these pages, a passage from the FCA Rulebook which says that lenders must communicate with borrowers in any reasonable method – ie can’t insist on the telephone.
If I’m right, could you direct me to where I will find that in the FCA Rulebook?
Thanks in advance.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
It’s not that clear for payday lenders, see https://debtcamel.co.uk/debt-collector-lender-phone-at-work/
Which lender is this and how often are they calling? Do you have any mental health problems that mean phone calls cause you anxiety?
CyrilV says
Well, my payday loan hell is over, all wiped barring £7/month to BPO on an old Sunny loan, which is no longer on my credit record and which I won’t be contesting in the near future.
But that’s by the by. Just a couple of questions regarding old loans that still show up on my credit record. I see Myjar have gone under. I was fortunate there in that I did get a refund. My last payment to them was in July 2016, and the loan shows as “paid and closed”. Now that they’re going out of business, will that be struck from my record before it’s due to disappear in July 2022, and if so, will it have any effect on my credit score?
Also I have an old Satsuma loan, again marked “paid and closed”, last payment being in March 2015. While Satsuma are still trading, of course, again what will happen to that record after March 2021 and likewise what would be the effect on my credit score?
Neither of these loans have anything owing to them by the way, they’re settled rather than “satisfied”.
Finally, let me thank you for all the good work you’ve done. Was nearly £14k in the hole and have got everything down to a much more manageable <£6k which is falling all the time.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Now that they’re going out of business, will that be struck from my record before it’s due to disappear in July 2022,
No.
Satsuma loan, again marked “paid and closed”, last payment being in March 2015
What is the settlement date?
Neither of these loans have anything owing to them by the way, they’re settled rather than “satisfied”.
With no default recorded, the debts will drop off 6 years after the settlement date. But they don’t harm your credit score. And not even mortgage lenders are likely to care that you had very old payday loans.
CyrilV says
Settlement date of the old Satsuma loan appears to be 6th Feb 2015.
Dave R says
Hi Sara,
Couple of queries re lenders updating my credit file.
SafetyNetCredit – have fully upheld my complaint, refunded me and promised to completely remove themselves from my credit file. The account was previously on there as closed/settled and they’ve said it would take 6-8 weeks to be removed from my credit file. However, last week it appeared as an open credit line on my credit file again – with a balance of £0. I’ve queried this and they’ve said “if we’ve agreed to make any changes to your credit file this will take 6-8 weeks from the date of your final response”. This would be around 29th Jan 2021 – should I just wait and see if it’s gone around then or does this not sound quite right?
Sunny/Elevate – they’ve been updating all the credit files for everybody recently as we know but on mine, it’s showing that they’ve removed 7 loans that were done as “pay day/short term” loan and then added 7 loans as “unsecured loans”. Clearscore description says “What does this mean?
This could mean that you opened a new account, or it might be because a lender had just shared some information relating to an old account.”
Do you understand what happens here? I’m very confused..
Cheers!
Dave
Sara (Debt Camel) says
yes I suggest you wait and see if this is sorted by the end of the month. But you might send SNC an email now saying that if this isn’t right by Feb 1st, you will be sending your complaint to the Financial Ombudsman.
No one has any idea what Elevate are doing. They should get this sorted in the end.
Helen says
Hi Dave,
Elevate didnt remove any of the 30 loans i had from my credit report, despite them supposedly doing so in administration. I emailed them and actually got a very helpful reply back (see below).I know it doesnt exactly match your problem but if the loans don’t disappear, make a Transunion dispute.
We have sent our last and final update to the Credit Reference Agencies, and all changes should have been implemented by the end of November 2020.
We are not able to confirm specifically which loans/if any were included in the update. If your credit file is incorrect, you will need to raise a dispute with the CRA directly and explain that Elevate Credit are in administration. A company in administration follow different reporting rules with the CRA so it is important that you point this out to the adviser so that they do not follow their normal procedures which may be to refer back to us to send an updated file (which we cannot do now).
RS says
I have a general query about interest calculations. I had 2 loans with 118, the first was paid off in full and the 2nd had an outstanding balance. Do you calculate the 8% interest payable on the overall credit amount due to be refunded or add the 8% interest to the amount paid on the 1st loan, then deduct the amount owing on the 2nd loan to give you an overall figure?.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Unhelpfully different lenders do different things. Few people can be bothered to take a complaint to FOS about this.
RS says
The decision has been upheld by the FOS on both loans so should they rule on this or do I just go with the lenders interest calculations?. I have queried their calculations anyway and asked for a full breakdown as the redress figure provided does not look correct to me.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
so they have accepted the adjudicator decision? That’s good.
Do you want to give the numbers, for just two loans they are pretty simple…
Loan 1 – what did you borrow, what payments did you make to it?
Laon 2 – what did you borrow? If this was a top up, what did you receive in cash? What payments have you made to it?
Scott says
Good evening Sara,
I would like your opinion on a matter.
I had a loan with UncleBuck, which from an email today is being written off as a result of lending practices.
I recieved an email from CRS who are the collections agency working on their behalf, offering to discount the (£210.00)balance if I pay £126.
I made this payment on the 31st December, only for UncleBuck to write off the same balance of £210 (based on interest and charges worth that exact amount as they cannot afford redress) 4 days later.
Therefore I have made an overpayment. Am I eligible to claim this back from the collections company?
Kind Regards,
Sara (Debt Camel) says
The latest update from the UB administrators is here: https://harrisons.uk.com/unclebuck-update/
They are wiping or reducing balances depending on how large their calculated redress is.
The email you have received probably doesn’t say what they calculated your redress at, but it must have been more than £210 that was the balance they mentioned.
The Harrison’s page says that people who have made payments after 27 March 2020 may get a full or partial repayment of them. I think your recent payment of £126 is one of those payments. I suggest you reply to the email you were sent and ask for a refund of it.
For other people reading this, you won’t be getting any refund, however small, if you didn’t have a balance at 27 March. They have no money to pay refunds.
Dave R says
Query about Satsuma/Provident now…
They’ve emailed me today which is the final day of the 8 week period, with the below:
“We are sorry that we have been unable to resolve your complaint at this time.
We can assure you that this matter is still under investigation and is receiving our urgent attention. We expect to be able to provide you with a full response in due course.”
And obviously they’ve said I have full right to refer to FOS now as it’s been longer than 8 weeks…
They sent an email about 5 weeks in saying that it was still under investigation and they would come back to me within the 8 weeks, which they have…My question is – is it worth waiting on them or referring to Ombudsman now? I feel like both options will have me waiting a while…
Are Satsuma/Provident quite awful to deal with re refunds?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
It is unlikely anyone has yet looked at your case. They are slow and often don’t give good offers… so I think it’s worth sending to FOS now.
Mike_p says
When I complained they made things as difficult as they could. They didn’t respond to my complaint until about 16 weeks and ignored all my emails asking for an update. I sent it to the FOS as soon as it hit 8 weeks but they dragged their heels for months not sending the FOS what they’d asked for. It was only a couple of loans and if they’d just rejected me in the allowed timeframe I would have probably just left it.
Dave R says
Interesting… did they uphold your case Mike?
Mike_p says
No they didn’t but as it was only two loans I wasn’t expecting them to. If they had replied in the stipulated timeframe I would have probably just left it as I have with other lenders, but as they made it difficult for me and ignored my emails I took it further.
Terry says
Hi. I have a bit of a random question. I checked my credit report on Clearscore and can see accounts with MPP Money and Vivus – of which both companies no longer exist.
Is it still possible to get these removed from my credit report with both companies having dissolved a while ago?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Not unless you have a good reason to argue the credit record is wrong.
are these debts settled? deafuled?
Terry says
Theyre settled and from years ago. I suppose I’m just panicking as I’m hoping to be in a situation to speak to mortgage advisers before the end of the year and I don’t want these being a stumbling block.
As they’re settled I’m sure there won’t be an issue. I do have one solitary default from 2016 which I believe will be removed next year as it’ll have been 6 years.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
old (more than 2 years) settled payday loans arent usually a problem but you must go through a mortgage broker, not direct to a lender and do tell them all about your past history. They cant help you if you don’t tell them something.
Dave R says
Has there been any update on 24/7 Moneybox?
I believe I logged in and accepted the redress offer months ago but haven’t had any update and when I log in it says claim accepted and no further updates..
carol h says
Hi Dave, i’m same as you, waiting to hear, i remember when i logged on to accept it said all claims had to be in by 31st Dec, so i’m guessing still a wait yet, to go through them all and divvy out between us, i’m not holding up much hope of getting much back unfortunately.
Dave R says
Hi Carol,
Thanks for the response, interesting to know.
I’m more interesting in it from a credit report amendment to be honest. Find it so frustrating that they agree to make changes but it takes sooooo long.
carol h says
Hi Sara,
I have had a response from moneyboat they have not upheld the complaint but are offering a goodwill payment of 1241.88 for the last 3 loans,
loans i had are:
09-03-16 250 interest paid 65.08 2 mths
12-07-16 300 interest paid 70.45 2 mths
05/09/16 1000 interest paid 604.39 6 mths
28/2 17 1000 interest paid 648.15 6 mths
20-10-17 400 interest paid 71.74 2 mths
18-12-17 1000 interest paid 304.57 6 mths
30-04-18 1500 interest paid 856.57 6 mths
In your valued opinion is this a good offer?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Not a good offer really. They haven’t even added on 8% interest which you would always get at FOS. On just those loans that would be another couple of hundred…
The Ombudsman probably wouldn’t uphold the first couple of loans as they are small.
But you would be quite likely to get a refund for the third loan and very likely to get a refund for the 4th loan.
If you want a refund for both of those I suspect you will have to go to the Ombudsman.
But if you would be happy to compromise, you could go back to them and say in the interest of a speedy resolution you will be happy if they refund the last 4 loans.
carol h says
** Sorry the figures on my previous post were incorrect
Hi Sara,
I have had a response from moneyboat they have not upheld the complaint but are offering a goodwill payment of 1241.88 for the last 3 loans, loans i had are:
09-03-16 250 interest paid 65.08 2 mths
12-07-16 300 interest paid 70.45 2 mths
05/09/16 750 interest paid 604.39 6 mths
28/2 17 750 interest paid 648.15 6 mths
20-10-17 400 interest paid 71.74 2 mths
18-12-17 500 interest paid 304.57 6 mths
30-04-18 1000 interest paid 856.57 6 mths
In your valued opinion is this a good offer?
Reply
Sara (Debt Camel) says
I think my reply is much the same. Perhaps you would be a bit less likely to get a refund on loan 3, but loan 4 still looks pretty likely to me.
Dave R says
Quick query re Moneyboat:
They didn’t uphold my case but offered me a gesture of goodwill payment of around £850 which was half of the interest paid across all loans. I accepted this rather hastily and now regret it and feel I could have got a better deal. I wrote to them and asked if we could at least remove the last few loans from my credit file but they’ve said they can’t. I shouldn’t have accepted their final response and should have at least tried to negotiate before then taking it to FOS.
I sent them an email saying I wished to withdraw from my agreement of their offer and detailed a load of reasons that I feel it wasn’t satisfactory but they are standing firm and saying that: We made you a gesture of goodwill offer in relation to the complaint, which you accepted in full and final settlement of the complaint – we therefore consider the matter to be closed and will not be commenting any further:
I’m guessing there’s absolutely nothing I can do now?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
There is nothing you can do.
Well there are two rare exceptions.
If they failed to tell you you had the right to go to FOS, then you may be able to take the claim to FOS.
And if there were clear factual errors in what they sent you eg they missed off some of your loan, then you can go to FOS and argue they mislead you.
Dave R says
I do feel that some of the detail in their final response is misleading in all honesty. I will go back to them and state that I believe I still have a right to approach the FOS and see if they can reconsider before I do so. I don’t hold out much hope but worth a try.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
It has to be clearly wrong rather than misleading.
Dave R says
So I spoke with my FOS case handler that is dealing with another case for me – and she kindly let me run her through my thinking on this Moneyboat issue – she said that from how I explained it to her, it would be worth submitting the case still.. but obviously can’t promise anything. Have sent it off, will let everybody know what happens!
E says
Hi, I am waiting for 118 to reply to the FOS decision, can I ask how long yours took for them to reply? Thanks
Paul says
Hi Sara, I wonder if you could offer any advice please. I got into a payloan loan spiral so stopped paying some of the debts to Avant amd Peachy.
I owe £350 to Avant and £800 to peachy. They both defaulted in 2018 so show missed payments since then. Im now in a position to settle these debts from having no social life last year.
Would I be better paying the full amount or see if they will accept a lower offer?
Thanks, Paul
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Strangely repaying the debts in full or in part won’t improve your credit score. And as you aren’t being chased about them at the moment, I think the first thing you should do is put in a claim to the Peachy administrators – if you win this the interest will removed from what you owe AND the negative mark on your credit record will be removed.
Same with Avant but they aren’t yet in administration… so email emailcomplaints@avantcredit.co.uk with the template letter here https://debtcamel.co.uk/refunds-large-high-cost-loans/
Ted says
Hi – just a very quick query.
Ombudsman found in my favour re: Lending Stream loans – all from 2014 and all since paid. The amount redress is pretty small (about £250) but I have now been waiting for this to be paid for 16 weeks. I know they are notorious but I’m at a loss wondering what I can do.
I’ve told FOS and they sent reminder. I’ve contacted them approx 6 times via their chat function just get fobbed off with ‘will escalate to our complaints dept’
Any advice?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
have LS accepted the decision?
Ted says
Hi Sara – yes they have accepted.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
I suggest 2 things.
1) leave them a very poor review on Trust Pilot: https://uk.trustpilot.com/review/lendingstream.co.uk
2) tell the FCA (their regulator) what you think of their very slow payment process. copy this to LS and hopefully they will hate it!
The FCA won’t intervene in your case but hopefully LS will hate this. Email to consumer.queries@fca.org.uk. Copy this email to stuart@global-analytics.com and chris.deboer@global-analytics.com
_______________________________________________________________________________________
Subject: Gain Securities (689378) trading as Lending Stream have not sent me an agreed refund after 16 weeks
Say that LS have agreed to refund you following a FOS decision, attach the email confirming this. But after 16 weeks you have still not been paid despite you contacting them numerous times. Say it is impossible to get to speak to a manager or indeed anyone that actually knows what is happening at all. Say you think this shows a contempt for their customers and as an authorised firm they should be made to have an email address for complaints where people’s problems are actually addressed, not just brushed away.
Ted says
Thanks so much for this – will do every bit of it!
Carl says
Hi Ted,
I’m in the same position, went all the way with ombudsman to final decision in September which LS agreed to pay me but I am still awaiting payment from them and chasing daily on live chat with the same response of “we will escalate”. No emails are replied to either. Informed ombudsman still no payment and they have chased also and still nothing!
graeme burkhill says
Hi Ted/ Carl
I received my LS refund about 6 months ago so this may not still be effective but this is what i did after waiting months for a refund. I downloaded a call recording app to my phone and recorded the call ( i explained i was doing this) so then when i got a committed date of payment i asked them to repeat it and then stated i had it recorded with their permission and i would take it to a lawyer if i wasn’t paid. …
I was paid the next day
May have been chance, but i dont know.
Was well worth the 99p i spent at the app store
Ted says
Worth a shot, but actually feel dread calling them at all its literally wasted hours and hours of my time. Glad you got yours sorted and at least someone somewhere is getting their refund.
Ted says
Yep same – they emailed me to say they would contact me within 5 working days, told me to reply to that email which I did … 5 times no response. Grim.
Carl says
Does anybody know if Zebit are still active? A quick internet search does not appear to show any information? Has anybody made complaints and had success or is it now too late? Fantastic website and community
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Zebit was a brand name of Lending Stream, no longer used. But Lending Stream is still in business so complain to them.
Dave R says
Hi Sara,
I had a claim against Savvy not upheld. I took the loan at a time when I had quite a few other loans and I think there was even a default on my credit file at the time as well.
Is it worth appealing their decision or going to FOS as it was just one loan – for £650, so 12 months…
Sara (Debt Camel) says
I haven’t heard that they will listen to an appeal – if you want to try this be clear that if they do not respond in a week, your complaint will be going to the ombudsman – don’t let this drag on for weeks.
Also supply them with three months of bank statements from before the loan application.
Ashleigh says
Dear All,
Having received my refund beginning of Dec, I’d just like to inform you that Myjar (previously know as Txtloan) have now gone into administration. Customer service still operational atm but the administrators will he handling any future complaints/queries.
Zoe says
End of last year I completed an R40 online to claim back the tax free amount from my refunds tax year 19/20. I received a letter from the tax office saying they needed proof. Annoyingly the online form doesn’t allow you to attach anything so posted off my tax certificates from two lenders with a covering letter explaining these were from refunds for irresponsible lending and I wished to claim back my tax free allowance.
I was then rather shocked two weeks letter to receive a letter stating based on the information I had submitted I had underpaid tax and owed £600!!! I’m salaried and my pay is the same every month plus surely the companies deducting the tax from refunds are submitting this to the tax office so it’s not like I am disclosing new information to them. Since going back into lockdown ive had huge difficulties trying to get through to HMRC to find out if this is an error. I was just wanting to know if others have had the same issue. Needless to say I wish I hadn’t bothered requesting it now.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Are you a higher rate tax payer? Or very close to being one?
Zoe says
Hello,
I went over by £800 last tax year as I have a company car. I just assumed the companies that have refunded me would have already gave notified HMRC of tax I have paid. I wish I had just left it now.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
I am sorry, my article on this does make it clear that high rate tax payers may well owe more. It is possible this would have caught up with you even if you hadn’t put in the reclaim.
Zoe says
No need to apologise it is what it is I just couldn’t work it out and the queues to get through since we are back in lock down have been over an hour for HMRC
Jo says
I put a complaint to fernovo about 5 loans I had with quidie (last one defaulted still paying 10 a month)they acknowledged my complaint 7/11/20 so 8 weeks was 2/1/21 hadn’t heard anything by 4th so I sent an email for an update.
Their response wasn’t even a final response like I’ve had before saying I can go to the fos it was just a normal email saying, if you drop your complaint we will take the default charges off your last loan bringing your outstanding balance down from 135 to 60.
They also didn’t send any information which I requested in the first complaint email.
Can I go to fos without their final response or all the old loan information.
Many thanks
Sara (Debt Camel) says
it has been over 8 weeks so you can.
Matt says
Hi,
I sent a complaint to Loans2go, and as a result they sent me a full and final offer saying the loans were affordable but as a good will gesture they were prepared to offer me £250.
I sent them an email a bit too quickly saying I was happy with the offer but that I had one question about my credit report, about 20minutes later I sent another email clarifying that I wanted to get an answer to my question before accepting the offer but then the day after they replied saying the money would be in my bank account by the end of the day.
Does that leave me with no rights to go to the Ombudsman?
Thanks for the help.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
This is tricky.
Do you now think you should have had more money?
Or is your main concern your credit report?
Matt says
Hi Sara,
All my loans were paid in advance, so I don’t think they can remove the loans from my credit report but looking at some of the Ombudsman decisions, I found one with loans2go very similar to mine, so pretty sure I could get more money.
Basically when I gave them my bank statements you could see a lot of payday loans being taken with other sites as well as a lot of gambling and what they said in their final report to me was that had they known about the gambling they wouldn’t have lended me the money but looking here: https://www.financial-ombudsman.org.uk/files/291880/DRN-2347937.pdf that is exactly the same situation as me and he got all his interest paid back and more.
Thank you,
Sara (Debt Camel) says
So when did you tell them the £250 was inadequate?
Matt says
When they replied to my first email, they ignored the second one I sent 20minutes after the first one.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
and the second one said the amount offered was too low? Or was it just asking what they would do to your credit record? Have they offered to amend your credit record?
Matt says
When they replied they said: “as a responsible lender, we are legally obligated to report the account conduct correctly to the credit reference agencies. Therefore, we cannot report incorrect information. ”
Then just said we’ll transfer the fund, so I replied straightaway that the offer that the offer was too low and later that day they transferred £250.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
ok, then send your complaint to the Financial Ombudsman.
Rob Gore says
I made my first ever complaint to Loans2go in March 2020 and had the same response.. I accepted in May 2020 and my credit file was updated..
If I had known then what I know now I would not have accepted there offer and gone through the FOS as I would have received a far better settlement. that said, no 2 cases are the same
Jared says
Hi I made an affordability complaint on a Payday loan I made with Lending Stream back in 2016. My loan was then taken over by Drafty which I have seen is part of Lending Stream. as I correct in making the whole claim to Lending Stream? This has been escalated now to FOS as I had no response from Lending Stream. Complaint was escalated to FOS in November – how long does it usually take for the FOS to investigate after initial consent email?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
yes Drafty is just a LS brand name. FOS will probably be waiting for the case file from LS. I suggest you wait until next month and then ask FOS what progress has been made.
Kerri says
Hi ,
I wonder if anyone can help, I have made an affordability complaint for 3 loans with lending stream, taken over 3 months in 2017, total at the time was £1,160. The debts were brought by Lantern in 2019, I have been on DMP and payments were made. DMP has now ended and I had no defaults on credit reports until I informed LS and L that I was making a complaint, now both have registered defaults with different dates. Complaint is with FOS now as LS did not uphold affordability complaint but said as goodwill they would clear one of loans but this would not affect any balance of loan with debt management company which Is basically not doing anything as the debts are zero with LS as they sold to L. I have offered to pay remaining balance to l if they remove defaults but they have refused. I am currently homeless and can’t gain housing (rent or mortgage) due to the defaults. I have never received default notices from either LS or L, does this mean I can challenge them?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
A Default Notice is a Consumer Credit Act requirement before you can be taken to court – it has nothing to do with a default on your credit record.
As you are homeless, have you asked FOS if they can prioritise your case?
Kerri says
Hi sara,
Yes I have asked FOS to prioritise my case, it has not been allocated case holder as yet, it’s been with them for 4 months. I wondered about the timing of defaults and as both LS and L registered defaults. i wasn’t able to pay loans pay back on the same month I had the last loan in 2017 and was on DMP, but defaults were not registered until August 2020 with retrospective dates added. I had cleared debts and my credit score was very good until August and within a day of receiving email to say I was making affordability complaint, the defaults were added and credit score plummeted. Unfortunately this coincided with my relationship breaking down, meaning I need to find somewhere else to live and the mortgage offers I had been offered were retracted and stuck now waiting for it be sorted.. I thought perhaps offer of paying loans in full (75% total is left) if defaults were removed was fair but this has been refused.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Go back to FOS and ask what is happening.
If LS sold the loan, at that point they will have realised that they should have added a default earlier – L will then use that same date. Although this looks like 2 defaults on your credit record, only 1 is used in credit scoring.
Lenders will not normally agree to remove a default if you offer to settle the debt – it is against the credit reporting rules to do this.
Kerri says
Thanks Sara, I will go back to FOS, part of issue is LS and L have registered different dates for defaults so it does look like four separate defaults instead of the two. This has been raised with both.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
L has to use the same date as LS.
Kerri says
I know it should be the same date but neither LS and L have been willing to change dates so they are the same and both saying they have reported accurately to CRA. L have been reported to different CRA with different dates as well. I will have to wait for FOS but seems bit unscrupulous to me that they only registered defaults after I had made affordability complaint despite the loans defaulting in 2017 and seems a bit of strategy. I really regret making a complaint now as it’s caused more issues.I think people should be aware that this can happen and weigh up the costs of making affordability complaint as If I had known this would happen, I wouldn’t have gone down this route.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
which date is the earlier one?
In practice the defaults were probably added because your loans was sold and not because of your complaint.
In any case, without a default the unpaid loan stays on your credit record forever. And would also be causing problems for a mortgage application.
It may seem as though the defaults are the main problem you have but that isn’t right, the main problem was unaffordable loans, and a complaint is the only way to deal with that.
Kerri says
Thanks Sara,
I’ll wait for FOS, I check my credit score every month as I have been rebuilding my score. The defaults were definitely not added when loans was sold as it was sold initially to another debt management company in 2017 and then to l in 2019. I have the credit report which shows each change each month over 12 months and the defaults were added the following day after my affordability complaint so nothing close to the date when loan was sold. I literally had provided by credit report to my mortgage advisor the day before with a solid good score and then went online the next day and it had dropped to poor.
Rob says
A company i complained about turned down my complaint about short term lending. FOS Ombudsman upheld my complaint. Had to refund interest and remove record and default from my credit file.
To date they have not removed default and are still updating it monthly with original default balance. Thus not carrying out Ombudsman ruling.
I have made FOS aware of this since last September and they keep saying they are looking into it.
Is there anything else I can Do?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Which firm is it?
Rob says
Sara, it is Evergreen Finance also known as Moneyboat
Sara (Debt Camel) says
oh them…
One option is to complain to the credit reference agencies but that can be painful when a company isn’t in administration.
I suggest you do two things.
1) leave them a very bad review on TrustPilot https://uk.trustpilot.com/review/moneyboat.co.uk
2) send an email to their regulator, the FCA. The FCA won’t look into this but hopefully Moneyboat will hate this and will actually resolve the problem.
Email to consumer.queries@fca.org.uk. Copy this email to accounts@evergreenfinance.co.uk
_______________________________________________________________________________________
Subject: Evergreen Finance (674154) trading as Moneyboat have not complied wth a FOS decision after 4 months
Explain the FOS decision and attach the email from FOS or from Moenyboat saying Moneyboat accepted it. Say that 4 months later they have still not cleared your credit record at the FOS decision said.
Say you know that the FCA will not look into your case but you thought ar Moneyboat’s regulator they should be aware of how poorlyMoneyboat are handling complaints and say you don’t think they should be allowed to carry on lending if they can’t comply with FOS decisions in a reasonable timescale.
If you were one of the people moneyboat accused of fraud, you might also add a sentence about that into your email to the FCA. they are a most unpleasant company to deal with…
James says
Hi,
Can you complain if someone has leant to you a stupid amount of times, often in quick succession, with a poor credit score, but theoretically affordable?
Thanks
Sara (Debt Camel) says
After a few loans in quick succession the lender should have looked more closely at your situation. If you had a poor credit score it seems unlikely the loans were actually affordable… who is the lender? how large were the loans?
James says
They are all 400+
For context, I was deep in to an overdraft (4 figures), so whilst theoretically I could (and did) pay back my loan each month it was because my paycheck would pay off some of my overdraft which I’d then use to make a repayment. I’m not sure if they deem that affordable, they shouldn’t but they might.
The company is quidmarket.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
That isn’t affordable! Affordable is if you can pay off one loan and get through the next month without having to borrow again.
Send the complaint to Quidmarket and then on to the Ombudsman if they don’t make you a good offer.
If you aren’t sure if an offer is good, come back and ask? A lot of people accept anything they are offered and only realise later they could have got 5 times as much…
Marie Darling says
Hi can anyone help I need to update my bank account details for quick quid I’ve tried the portal numerous times both on pc and mobile but it just goes blank when I submit I’ve also tried calling but after the voice message it just goes static I have also tried email but they just respond with the portal link lol does anyone have a phone number that works thanks
W says
Hello Sara,
I’ve received an email from the administration for 247moneybox (active securities limited) saying they have calculated my redress and the “revised balance still owed: £350.21, total calculated claim amount: £153.56”
I did not ask for a redress because I had a full and final settlement letter back in October 2019, where they wiped any outstanding amount due. Could you please tell me if I “accept” would I have to repay £350.21 but get £153.56 back? Or is the redress calculated after taking the revised balance into account, so I receive the full £153.56 without having to pay anything back?
Thank you for any information you provide Sara.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
I think they haven’t realised your debt was settled. But if they did, then they would not pay you this redress and you have effectively already received the benefit of it with the F&F.
I suggest you reply that you no longer have a balance with them as a full & final settlement was agreed in 2019 and attache the email/letter confirming this.
N says
Good evening. I have recently had an unaffordability complaint upheld for my provident/satsuma loans. The adjudicator has given them until the 22nd to respond. Does anybody know if satsuma usually agree with the adjudicators decision? Thankyou.
Paul says
Sorry to trouble you, I have a few quick questions that you may know of due to past cases
a) Do Pay Day loan Companies in answering a complaint tend to offer a lower redress amount in the hope that the customer just accepts it
b) If a complaint goes to the Financial Ombudsman is the Company charged for each case or is it included in their yearly agreement package. I should imagine the FOS have a lot of cases by the same company whether that be Lending Stream, Amigo etc.
c) If you know that the redress offer doesn’t cover an acceptable amount of the loans taken (for example 16 loans in a year and offer is from 9th loan when should be from 3rd/4th) is it worth going back to the Company to negotiate, listing reasons why or is it final their answer and should just go straight to FOS
Thanks for any help you could give.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
a) some do
b) it’s per case
c) it depends on the lender – who is it?
graeme says
Hi There
I have successfully used Sarahs help and templates to receive redress from all my historic lenders, however MrLender have not yet given a response and the 8 weeks is up in the next few days, is this normal for them to leave this until the last minute, no other firms have done this??
has anyone any experience of this with ML?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
have they acknowledged your complaint?
Paul says
I haven’t heard anything yet but my 8 weeks is only up next Thursday. At the time they only mentioned 6 loans that they was doing an historical review of but I produced more than enough evidence to cover all 14 loans I had with them (7 other pay day loans open when accepted, bank statements etc). We will wait and see their response. Let us know when you get an answer through.
graeme says
Hi Paul
Have you heard anything yet ?
Paul H says
No they rang a few days ago to ask if I could send in bank statements for the times I took out the loans and then on receiving them they would provide a final response within a week but I’ve already provided them with lots of other evidence including credit report, debt letters and much more. Other firms I didn’t even have to provide any evidence at all for and just the number of loans and my complaint letter they offered me a redress but these are making it so much harder.
graeme says
yes , pretty much the day i put complaint in, around 20th Novembre, just heard nothing since?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
ok, well they do tend to drag things out.
They also often make pretty poor offers but can sometimes be persuaded to improve them, so it’s worth a try.
Mike_p says
They reply by post to slow things down. They claimed they had sent my response before the 8 weeks was up but I didn’t actually get the letter until about 10 days afterwarrds.
graeme says
Thanks, did you receive a suitable offer ?
Mike_p says
Yes – it was only a couple of loans and quite a small offer, but I accepted as I didn’t think I would get any more by going to the FOS. They emailed me to ask for the address to send the response to, and were quite happy to receive acceptance and my bank details my email, but they insisted on sending the repsonse by post and wouldn’t say why (other than some vague it’s company policy response.)
Carol H says
I’m waiting for a response from Mrlender there 8 weeks is up next Tuesday, but I rang to ask for final response to be sent by email, the guy who I spoke to said he would put a note on to request it be sent via email.. Will see if it does though? Will also be interesting to see what they come back with as from thier own review late last year it said all loans were affordable..
Also has anyone had any dealings with wageme and their response times. Thanks in advance
graeme says
Hi
I don’t know if @ Carol H can see this as her reply from ML was today , I was wondering if you received this?
Paul says
I know some firms send the final outcome by letter to your postal address which probably makes it harder to reply or contest points they answered or to negotiate.
Thankfully some are by phone or email so I didn’t know if it was best for both parties if a fair outcome could be reached without it going down the Financial Ombudsman route (saves months of waiting and threat of administration (eg Myjar) compared to the cost of the case to them and them losing).
In the case I mention it’s Ferratum. So the 1st loan was low then increased each month to almost max allowed (£500) by loan 4 but they are only considering from loan 11 onwards (biggest gap from 1 loan finishing to next one starting was 4 days). Reading through posts on here I know some mention they was to quick to accept the first offer from these loan companies.
Therefore to help me with this and others going forward was wondering for some firms if they play on the fact that they know from the complaint that a person’s got debt problems so they they try to save money by offering a redress amount they know is lower than it should be in the hope it’s accepted given the persons present finances. Therefore is it worth going back to try to negotiate a more suitable offer without being overly greedy or just go straight down the FOS route knowing you have a strong case/plenty of evidence. Thanks for all your help.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
That sound like a poor offer from Ferratum. You could well get a refund from loan 4 from FOS. If you want to try to negotiate however you have to offer a compromise – they have offered form loan 11, you think you could get from loan 4 – would you be happy with a compromise of from loan 6 or 7?
Some lenders won’t ever negotiate. If you want the maximum amount you probably have to go to FOS.
Paul H says
Hi Sara, we did reach a suitable compromise that was much better than their original offer and I know they get a bad press Pay Day loan companies and rightly so in some cases but with each of my reply’s I sent to Ferratum they responded the same day and after agreeing the new redress offer amount the money was paid into my account the same day. The complaint took about 5 weeks also for them to answer so decent service and response time from Ferratum. Thanks for your help.
Chris B says
Hello,
I’ve had a claim going for CashEuroNet (QQ, P2P) etc. I got an email from them the other day saying they can’t verify my bank details. They emailed me back saying they need a whole months statement, including name, address and showing income to verify all bank details. I haven’t send anything yet as queried why they need all that. Email below:
“Thank you for contacting us regarding your claim against CashEuroNet UK, LLC (in administration). Unfortunately, we are not able to proceed with assessing your claim until we can confirm your banking information.
If you have not yet done so, please send a copy of a bank statement to bankstatements@CashEuroNetuk.co.uk as soon as possible so that we can validate your details. The statement should be in your name, contain a full month of transactions and dated within 60 days of the date of this email. This should also be where your employer’s deposits are sent.
Please note it may take up to 30 days to review your bank statement prior to submitting your claim for assessment If your claim is upheld, it is highly likely that the payment you receive will be much smaller than your claim amount. This is because it is expected that the total value of all accepted claims received will significantly exceed the money available to be shared out.”
I’m lost on why they need it all?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
no one understands this, but they keep insisting on it.
Tom says
Hi Sara,
I’ve posted on these pages about Satsuma before!
Having won a complaint against them at the FOS, I finally managed to get them to remove the two defaults from my credit record. They have finally done that but they have just removed the defaults and ticked every payment from when I took out the loans (2018/19) to the present day as having been made successfully. This clearly is not accurate but also leaves my credit record as showing that I have two open loans with Satsuma, which I don’t!
I have tried and tried to get them to change it but they don’t even acknowledge my contact. I have also got back in touch with the FOS and not heard anything from them either.
Any other suggestions of who I can contact?! It just seems to me to be outrageous that I can’t precipitate any action despite the FOS finding in my favour, and Satsuma agreeing!
Thanks in advance.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Send Satsuma a new complaint and ask for compensation of 3100 as well as correcting your credit record. And say it goes to FOS in 8 weeks. That will be a second FOS fee that they have to pay for messing this up.
Simon says
Hi Sara,
I have spent the last couple of years sending off all of my payday loans complaints ( the majority of which have been upheld). Please could you advise if it is possible to claim the tax back on the redress that would have been paid to HMRC by the lender before they paid me my redress? I’m not entirely sure how all of this works, but had an email from a claims company saying they could claim the tax back (obviously I want to do this myself if I can). In the year in question I earned around 42k which I paid tax on (PAYE), I also received about 4K in redress from payday lenders which I was wondering if I could claim the tax back on from HMRC?
Thanks
Sara (Debt Camel) says
You need to know how much of the 4k was “8% interest” as that is the only part that was taxed.
See https://debtcamel.co.uk/ppi-payday-refund-get-back-tax/.
As that says, if you are a higher rate tax payer or close to it, you may actually owe HMRC money.
Adam says
Hi,
Hoping you can help…
I took out a loan with Different Money LTD in July 2016 for £600 & £520.68 interest was added. The loan defaulted in August 2016 as I was in a bad financial way and took out a fair few payday loans. Different Money dissolved in November 2016, and the loan was sold to United Kash collections company, who emailed in November 2016 to tell me they had bought the debt. I was never told Different Money was dissolving or given the opportunity to put in a claim.
I put it to the back of my mind and completely forgot about it (I know this is the worst thing I could have done). I’ve had no communication from United Kash or Different Money since November 2016, but today I’ve had a final demand email from United Kash demanding payment of £1120.68 or they will start litigation proceedings and take me to court, after 4 years of not hearing anything about it…
Is there anything I can do here? Do I have a leg to stand on, even if it’s just writing the interest off, or do I need to pay the full value to United Kash before they take me to court?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
What is your current financial situation like? They may take a settlement offer?
Adam says
Thanks for the reply Sara!
I’m in a stable(ish) position at the moment, I don’t have much money put aside to pay a lump sum but I’ll see if they will accept a repayment plan
I also forgot to mention that there is no trace on my credit file of this loan ever existing, no defaults or outstanding balances, is this normal?
I’ve checked all three CRAs it definitely isn’t present on my file
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Strange. It sounds like some sort of error.
Sam says
Hi, I used this site to write in my initial complaint to a loan company (albeit not payday loan but still one with quite high interest attached due to my poor credit rating). They have refused my complaint on the basis they did an affordability check with me first, and discussed what the loan was for.
However I would say the fact I had already taken 2 loans out not long before this one (one of which was for £9000) and my below average credit rating should have been red flags to them.
Unfortunately, and I have not mentioned this in my complaint, I had a gambling addiction and this is why I kept taking out loans. I obviously did not explain this in the application and said it was for home improvements.
I have now stopped gambling and received help but have all these huge loans to repay and have entered a debt management programme. In fact I entered this before I even made the first repayment to this particular loan company.
So if I go to the Ombudsman now, am I likely to get anywhere? As I say, the basis of the complaint is that they did not properly assess my credit rating – besides the 2 loans taken prior to this one, I had taken several others over the previous year or so (some repaid) and had credit card debts too. I was getting a lot of refusals by this point from other companies that obviously felt it would be irresponsible to lend, but this company still did.
It was £2500 from 1st Stop. Now known as Oplo I believe.
Thanks for your help
Sara (Debt Camel) says
That is a very large loan. That means the lender should have made good checks that you can afford it. Send the complaint to the ombudsman and enclose your bank statements for the three months before and three months after the start of the loan – that will probably show the loan was unaffordable. The Ombudsman is not judgmental about gambling – it is accepted as an addiction.
Sam says
Ok thanks. Well I also complained along the same lines to Shawbrook who lent me £9000 a year ago. Not had reply yet but can follow the same way to the Ombudsman
Sara (Debt Camel) says
how much do you currently owe? and how much can you afford to repay a month to your debts?
Sam says
Ok so the full situation is this:
I have 5 loans totalling approximately £24,000
I have written complaints to Shawbank (£9000, 3rd to lend), 1st Stop (£2500, 4th to lend) and Bamboo (£1000, 5th to lend and with very high interest, so its about £1800 to repay)
I have been in the DMP since last June paying £297 a month. I’d have to check exact figures but I think I still owe about £8000 to Shawbank, £2000 to 1st Stop and £1100 to Bamboo.
I am expecting Shawbank and Bamboo to not uphold my complaints either of course but they haven’t responded yet.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
ok so if you can win the affordability complaints your amount owed would drop a lot and your DMP would end much sooner. Well worth trying!
Holly D says
Hi Sara,
Would it be possible for a payday lender to disclose a business file to FOS covering the last six years, when there may have been loans provided by the lender seven or eight years ago, and can FOS double check or do they accept the lenders business file as provided.
Thanks again for your advice,
Sara (Debt Camel) says
who is the lender? Have they denied having any information about earlier loans?
Holly D says
Satsuma. I have been in financial difficulty for many years and I have lost out on redress from Wonga and Sunny.
FOS have been very helpful, however, what I am concerned about is that they may have accepted Satsuma’s word that there were no loans prior to 2014, and that Satsuma are not prepared to look beyond that date. The bank will charge me for providing sight of any transactions which are more than six years old. I just want to make sure that I am not losing out again.
Any advice is most gratefully received.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
I’m sorry but do you know there were earlier loans or are you just wondering? Have you looked at your old emails – there may be some record there?
Sonya says
SATSUMA
I have just emailed them to ask them for an early settlement figure and they have come back with the following:-
“Your total balance is £515.47 and this would need to be paid in full to settle the loan. Due to the account being past the maturity date there is no early settlement quote available”
“Your loan was due to end in December 2019, meaning you would need to pay the balance in full to fully settle the loan”
However thy sent me a settlement figure back in October 2020??
Sara (Debt Camel) says
You can’t make a lender offer you a partial settlement.
Have you looked at making an affordability complaint to them? Was this the first loan you had from them?
Paul H says
Hi Sara, I had two loans with Lending stream about 2 years ago. I’ve sent a complaint to them and they only upheld the first loan which I find very odd considering the second loan was taken just after the first was repaid. Anyway the first loan is only worth a very small amount to me, the second is larger. The second loan I paid a partial settlement to close it but they seem to have left it open on my credit file and since I’ve complained they are now asking me to pay the outstanding. What can I do??
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Sent your complaint to the Financial Ombudsman – the article above explains how.
Paul says
Thanks Sara, they are admitting the error now but I’m angry as I couldn’t understand why my credit score wasn’t improving for two years. I haven’t been able to get a better mortgage deal etc and I feel they should be accountable for that. What are the implications for them for effectively ruining my credit score through their error?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
It may be hard to prove that their error lead to your credit problems. After all you did borrow from a payday lender and that used to be a barrier to a good mortgage deal for a year and from the start of the pendemic it has been two years.
But if you think you can justify it, ask them for compensation and take the complaint to the Ombudsman if they say No.
Paul says
Well I’ve had a mortgage broker tell me basically I won’t get a deal due to this loan being outstanding for so long. That’s the only reason I was aware of it. I’m not going to let them get away with it.
Sam says
Hi Sara
Not sure where all the comments have gone? Mine related to 1st Stop and Shawbank loands of £2500 and £9000 respectively. You asked me some questions and I got an email prompting me to reply, but now I am on here I can only see one comment posted yesterday by someone, and the rest including mine have gone?
Dale says
1st stop unfortunately renamed their business and claim no affiliation to their previous trading name, thus avoiding having to take on affordability complaints. Frustrating and I lost out on thousands through a very strong case.
Leanne says
Yes I had this same issue, however they did manage to get a CCJ against me, which they sold on to T M legal services. So although they are not willing to look at my complaint regarding irresponsible lending, they’re still trying to get me to pay for a CCJ!
Ian says
Hello, I had a debt with lending stream that was sold to lantern with whom I now have an arrangement to repay of £1 per month (part of a self managed DMP).
I made an affordability complaint to lending stream and they agreed a refund of £296 but the balance is about £710. I asked them if I will be refunded that amount directly as they no longer own the debt!
They then wrote to me saying that if I accept the refund then lending stream will repurchase the account from lantern and I will owe the remaining balance to lending stream, they also said ‘there is no redress due to you from our end.’ Meaning they will not make the refund directly to me.
My question is, can they do this? I have an arrangement in place with lantern to repay and they have always been much easier to deal with than lending stream ever were? Thanks for your help!
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Yes they can – this is the normal way refunds are handled when a balance is still owed on the loan to a debt collector. You can then make an arrangement with LS eg to pay them £1 a month.
Leanne says
Hi Sara,
I put in a complaint about Uploan (a subsidiary of Peachy) last year which was rejected and the FOS would not look into it due to them going into administration.
After much pushing, they have now accepted they should never have loaned me the loans, and have reduced the balance accordingly. However, they have sold the debt to Perch capital, who have registered a default on my credit file! What can I do to have this removed?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
So the balance with Perch has been reduced?
have you made an arrangement to repay the debt?
Leanne says
Yes it’s been reduced but a default has been added.
Yes I have, I’m paying £20 per month, so it’ll take years to clear (it’s £1700)
Sara (Debt Camel) says
are Uploan removing the default from your credit record? If so Perch have to do the same.
But do you have other problem debts? If so, I suggest you talk to National Debtline on 0808 808 4000. It’s important to see the whole picture, not firefight a lot of debts and try to improve your credit record.
Leanne says
Thanks Sara, after using your site and lots of back and forth I’ve managed to reduce over £20k worth of debt to a little over £8k and now repaying each one at comfortable monthly installments. I still have a couple of complaints in with FOS so that may bring it down further.
I have logged a complaint with Assett Collections and Investigations (Perch Capital) as they are the ones who have added the default. I have sent them evidence of Uploan stating they should not have loaned to me, and that they are unable to change the CRA records as it’s now held with Perch.
Jo says
Hi Sara,
I have previously received advice to go to the ombudsman for my Lending Stream payday loan refund and received a better response than the adjudicator originally provided, so thank you for that advice.
I accepted the FOS settlement figure on the 06.10.20 and when I followed this up at the beginning FOS said they had 4 weeks to settle.
Lending Stream are just the worst, they don’t reply to emails, I’ve been on live chat numerous times and nothing happens. Anyway on Wednesday I received an email and link to input my bank details, when I clicked on the link it asked me to confirm my bank details so I could be refunded £374.21 when the settlement amount agreed with FOS and Lending Stream was £581.48! I emailed them through the system to report it’s incorrect and I’ve been on live chat again which are unable to help with complaints. It’s just ridiculous, they are just stalling and dragging the whole process out, why can’t they stick to the FOS ruling and settle within the timescales. It’s just not fair having to chase up repeated. Just a word of caution to all to double check the amount prior to accepting it!
Tom says
Hi Jo,
If you don’t mind my asking, did Lending Stream agree with the adjudicator, even though you didn’t?
In any event, how long did it take between the adjudicator decision and the ombudsman decision?
I agree that they are hopeless to deal with! I got an adjudicator decision over the weekend and whilst I think I could probably get slightly more if it went to an Ombudsman, if Lending Stream would agree with the adjudicator, I’d be happy to accept it just so I can draw a line under it. It’s already been going on nine months!
Jo says
Hi, I’m not sure if Lending Stream agreed with the adjudicator, this wasn’t disclosed to me. I wasn’t happy with the response based on guidance from this site. The adjudicators response was to refund interest on loans 8 and 9, whereas the Ombudsman decision was loans 5-9, which is around £300 difference. I do think it was worth doing, however in relation to timescales I received the adjudicators decision in May and Ombudsman in October, so took a fair amount of time. To note, I contacted the Ombudsman again to say they still hadn’t paid and received payment within a couple of days, not sure if coincidence, pleased I persevered in my case
Dale says
I put in a complaint to me lender back in 2019, I accepted their first offer rather naively but nevertheless they never paid statutory interest on this. I complained to FOS who threw my complaint out saying I accepted their offer so that’s that. Not sure how that is fair as I thought statutory interest was compulsory?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Nothing about redress is “compulsory” – there is a standard offer from FOS, but it’s not set down in the regulations anywhere.
A lot of people have accepted a poor offer too quickly :(
Melissa says
Hi
I did claims for all my PDLs last year and settled with them all. With sunny it went to ombudsmen who sided with me but then went into administration so my claim is with them. With peachy they wrote off my balance and again my claim with the administrators currently.
Ive suddenly had about 10 elevate credit loans appear on my credit report this month. It says they may be old loans but surely they shouldnt just appear if theyre contested or awaiting claim? Will they be removed again. Its really hit my credit report bad when it was starting to look a lot better.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
see https://debtcamel.co.uk/500000-sunny-customers-tiny-refunds/ and comments beneath it.
Joyce says
Hi
I received an email from sunny due to the fact they have gone in admin they said my potential redress would be 2200 I was wondering would the redress be lower than what the potential is?? If so why is this
Sara (Debt Camel) says
I am sorry but it will be massively less – about 1% of that amount. See https://debtcamel.co.uk/500000-sunny-customers-tiny-refunds/
Chris Mitchell says
Hello Sara – I note earlier on in this thread that you suggest even if a debt has been sold on, then you complain about affordibilty to the Original Lender, What do you do if the orginal lender has gone bust? Apologies if this has already been explained.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
There is probably nothing you can do. Who is the original lender?
Chris Mitchell says
1st Stop Loans – Now owned by Asset colletions and investigations – Original debt 500, now stands at 1100 – From 2013.
(being pursued by TM Legal).
Sara (Debt Camel) says
When did you last make a payment to this?
Chris Mitchell says
Feels complicated – As I have had a few debts that TM have pursued – But to this debt, none I believe. All the rest have either been written off following affordabilty cliams or I have paid them off. They are complicated to deal with though, they broke GDPR by saying this debt was with Oplo and I contacted Oplo and gave them all my details only for Oplo to say they had never heard of me – So TM gave me the wrong company and I shared my personal details. TM offered to take 200.00 0ff this debt because of it.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
I suggest you talk to National Debtline on 0808 808 4000 about whether the debt may possibly be statute barred.
Leanne says
1st Stop were horrendous. They got a CCJ against me in 2013, refused to deal with my complaint as they had ‘changed their company name’ and therefore didn’t need to deal with redress and affordability claims, and then TM Legals have spent 6 years chasing for payment – the CCJ is now statute barred, I have never paid TM legal anything and have categorically refused to acknowledge the debt.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
a CCJ is NEVER statute barred – but after 6 years a creditor has to go back to court if they want to try to enforce it. So if you are ever contacted by them, talk immediately to National Debtline on 0808 808 4000
Danny says
I had a loan with Uncle Buck who I have contacted asking about a redress but Asset and Collections based in Blackpool took over the loan and I paid them, should I contact Asset and Collections too or is it not worth it?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
no, your complaint is against UB
carol h says
Hi Sara
MrLender did a review and came back with no further action so i put in a complaint, i got my response yesterday 8 weeks to the day they would not uphold my complaint, i went back saying i would take it to the FOS and asked how have they dealt with my complaint without ever requesting bank statements or further details, they have now come back and offered £759.11 for one loan the 4th loan from the list below, they have said as the 5th loan was nearly 2 years it would not be proportionate to review that one, or the first loan as that is over 6 years.
After twice being offered nothing i am happy with £759, i would just like your opinion
1. Nov 14 – £207 over 1 month
2. Dec 14 – 500 over 2 months
3. Mar 15 – £750 over 6 months
4. August 15- £750 over 6 months
5 Nov 17 -£1500 over 12 months – went into arrears but now paid
Sara (Debt Camel) says
The first loan is pretty small, not really worth arguing about.
A break of 2 years means loan 5 is separate from the others. But it is MUCH larger, so Mr Lender should have checked this very carefully. the fact it went into arrears suggests it isn’t affordable.
If you go to FOS you may well get loan 5 included in the refund – also you would have the missed payments / defaults removed from your credit record.
You could go back and say you would be happy to accept a refund on loans 4 &5 and negative marks removed from your credit record?
But as you say you are happy with £759 – the choice is up to you.
James says
Hi Sara
I’ve been checking my credit files and making sure PDL’s are being removed were instructed by the FCA, on checking my trans union I have a default from Mr Lender on my first loan, now I was on a repayment plan with them & about 10 different lenders at the time & they are the only ones to have given me a default, is this allowed while I was on a payment plan ?, if so why did all the others not do the same thing ?
The FCA advised them to refund and remove derogatory marks from my 2nd loan, I was also on a payment plan for this loan & they did not leave a default mark…
It will leave my file in 2024 but I’m looking for a mortgage next year and it’s the worst mark I’ve got .. I’ve contacted Mr lender asking them to remove it but I usually get some form of abuse from their staff, Thanks
James
Sara (Debt Camel) says
when was the 1st Mr Lender loan settled?
when was your last PDL with anyone taken out?
James says
Hi Sara
First loan settled May 2018, Last PDL taken out late 2018 October
Sara (Debt Camel) says
ok so by next year the default will have been settled several years ago You should be OK if the rest of your application is all right but go through a broker, don’t apply direct to a lender.
PS please don’t leave multiple comments. I publish and reply when I have time.
James says
Hi Sara,
When we win our affordability claims should any recognition of the payday loan be removed from credit file? Myjar and amigo have not removed them but marked them as up to date or settled.
Thanks
Sara (Debt Camel) says
FOS usually says only negative marks have to be removed.