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?
Lynne says
Sorry but how are you guys complaining to lending stream? When I’ve tried the online complaints form it doesn’t work and it won’t let me log into my account.
John says
Hi, it was the online form I used however they responded to me using this email
complaints@lendingstream.co.uk
Hope that helps , let me know how you get on
Lynne says
So Mr Lender’s decision is that it wasn’t irresponsible lending as I’d taken 3 loans out with them more than 6 years ago and that I ‘should’ve known before 6 years was up that I could make an unaffordable claim’! The last one was £600 and I think they were of a similar amount
Is this right? They then go on to say that if I realised I could claim in the last THREE years that I need to explain why I didn’t and how am I only doing it now! The reason I’m ‘only doing it now’ is a mixture of seeing it on this forum and also it was mentioned on Martin Lewis’s money programme!
Sara (Debt Camel) says
ok, well that is worth taking to FOS.
You have three years to make a claim from the time you became aware. A common time for people to have found out was when they were contacted by the Wonga or other administrators – if that was you, you are within the 3 year period from then.
Lynne says
In fact I just checked my experian report. It shows I opened an account with them on 31st December 2014 and then settlement date was 16 Sept 2016. There are 21 entries of £700 where it says ‘in good standing’ then there is one entry marked as ‘1 month late’ also for £700. Does that mean that’s how many loans I had?!
Then on 1 Oct 2016 it says “the lender has reported they sold the debt to an organisation which is not a member of our info sharing scheme”.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
it sounds odd – it would normally be the repayments you made to one loan.
did you realise the last loan had not been repaid?
Lynne says
I did realise the last loan wasn’t repaid and was sold onto someone called SSL I think. I contacted them several times to try and set up a payment plan but never got a reply.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Then this is another reason to send the case to FOS now. because if you wait until SSL contact you and threaten court action you may be outside the 6 months time to take the Mr Lender case to FOS.
John Michael says
Has anyone had or know of payouts from myjar administrators? If so was it much lower and did they take longer than the 8 weeks
Sara (Debt Camel) says
The administration only started 8 weeks ago, it will be along while yet before anything is known.
Do you owe them a balance?
John Michael says
No nothing outstanding – I had quite a few with them over the years , just wasn’t sure if it will be weeks or months from the administrators to be in touch and if anyone had any experience but if only went into administration 8 weeks ago then wouldn’t expect so.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
I would keep your expectations low.
Sara says
Hi has anyone had any dealings with piggyback?
I have an arrangement of £1.00 a month in place with them. Its meant to be taken on the 28th of every month. But they keep trying to take it before this date despite me getting in touch asking them why. They keep saying that its nothing to do with them its me or my bank. I have contacted the bank and they have said its set up for 28th. So I’m lost they tried to take it on 6th February and there wasn’t any funds in and I had over 50 emails from the claims team saying my payment hadn’t been paid. I told them when it was due and they said that because they had tried to take on the 6th that it had to be paid. They have now stopped the arrangement and said that they want me to pay £10 a month without even asking for income and expenditure details. Can anyone advise? I’ve complained to financial Ombudsman but because they are in liquidation im not sure they will do anything
Any advice would be appreciated
Thanks
Sara
Louise says
Hi
Wonder if you can help.
I made an irl complaint to peachy on 22/10/2020 which was acknowledged and the reply email
Said they would get back to me in 8 weeks . I have heard nothing since
In the mean time TM leagal services took legal action and submitted a claim despite knowing the account was in dispute. I defended the claim on this fact and TM legal have put the account on hold Which means that the case is stayed for the time being.
I was chasing up the claim and noted that there was also A form to complete on the peachy website which I haven’t done and the deadline has now passed. My question is what happens now, will they still assess my claim as I have emailed them or have I missed the boat by not filling the form out. Obviously it’s the court case that’s worrying me not the compensation. Am at a loss what to do next ?
I would be grateful for any thoughts or advice you could give
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Re the court claim, I suggest you talk to National Debtline on 0808 808 4000 or post on the Legal Beagles forum.
You could email Peachy and say you sent them an email complaint on ddmmyy, you had a reply saying they would get back to you but they never did so you would like that email to be accepted as claim. I don’t know how likely this is to work.
Lynne says
I have found TM Legal Services to be underhand and menacing threatening all sorts. They contacted me out of the blue mentioning a potential court claim against me. The email didn’t even say who the debt was for so I queried this. Turns out it was for uncle buck (whom I gather have now gone bust). I asked them to send me a copy of the original credit agreement. They did and it was from 5 years ago, the amount was £500 yet they were now saying I owed £1,000! In early December they said they’d give me ’60 days breathing space’. During that time I lost my job and a couple of weeks ago they started hassling me again, saying my time was up! . I told them I was out of work since they’d last been in touch. They asked me to send proof of what benefits I was receiving plus copies of bank statements! I told them where to go and lodged a formal complaint with their complaints team. Very unpleasant company.
Paul H says
Sorry I have a couple of questions that I don’t know if yourself Sara or anyone else can help me with. I will split them up.
I only have one complaint now left to send and I’ve put this off till last and it’s Lending Stream. The problem I have with them is it’s the only firm I can’t get hold of a full list of loans I had with them. I used them from 2012 to 2015 and then they put a negative mark on my credit file. I have the list of loans from 2013 and 2014 but Halifax only go back 7 years (2013 I was lucky I had a diary where I had written them in). 2012 I don’t have and 2015 was with a different bank account. I only have bank statements from 2014 also which does show multiple lenders on them and me being in a payment plan with Lending Steam prior to them then lending to me again for the 2014 loans. Reading on here I know they can be quite awkward LS. So I didn’t know if I really can only complain about the 2014 ones due to knowing them loans and having evidence to support my claim for irresponsible lending. I know they are over 6 years but in each complaint I have made so far I told them whilst I am only complaining now. Thanks for any help on this one.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Send the complaint in now and ask for a list of your loans. You don’t need to have that before you complain.
Paul H says
My 2nd question for any one really is any rough idea of the current wait time with the FOS. I appreciate staffing numbers with the FOS may be reduced due to these times and there seems a lot who are making complaints against these type of lenders currently.
So far I’ve had not needed to go to FOS with any other lender because the offers have been more than fair. Mr Lender been by far the worse though, requesting bank statements for the full 5 years I had loans with them plus lots of other documents. Unlike Lynne above they did agree that the loans I had prior to 2014 was unaffordable but basically anytime there was 45 days or so before I used them again they didn’t include, even though I was showing proof of other multiple lenders during that period that was still open when taking loans with them. So they ruled on just 6 out of the 13 (just under £1000 offer). For 3 of them I was in a lot worse position than ones they ruled on so would be confident with the FOS to get at least another £300 to £400 (max would be £1000) but the downside then is the wait time (depending on what it is) and the risk of them potentially going into administration and also there was over 40 emails between us and over 50 documents which they probably know would take me an age to attach with the FOS. I don’t need the money at this moment. So any advice would be greatly received.
Dave R says
Short answer – you have a long wait ahead most probably.
Long answer:
From what I’ve experienced so far with FOS (I have 2 cases with them – 1 against Lloyds Bank and 1 against Satsuma Loans):
Submit complaint online – receive auto-email acknowledgement of complaint submitted
Roughly 4 weeks later – an email from them to say that the complaint is loaded on their systems and has a ref number. Email states the case is waiting to be handed to a case handler and that it could take 4 months before this happens.
With the Satsuma complaint, they have confirmed that they have contacted Satsuma and asked for their files and not heard back – but they haven’t said I have a case handler yet. On the Lloyds complaint I’ve had no update other than the ref number.
jade says
Hi I have had an email r.e. uncle buck redress saying that my redress is £500 . It reads as if though they aren’t paying any redresses due to insufficient funds within the company. Please could you confirm if you know if this is correct? Sorry if it’s already been mentioned I searched posts but couldn’t find anything . Thanks
Sara (Debt Camel) says
yes I think that is correct – there is no money to be paid out.
Lynne says
That explains why they’re suddenly chasing me for a grand when the original loan was 500 – 5 years ago !
Sara (Debt Camel) says
not really, you are being chased by someone that has bought the debt aren’t you? Not by UB? I think your loan was probably sold a while ago. Debt collectors often wait years hoping you are back able to repay them
alan says
Hi, put in an affordability complaint to peachy last week, they replied saying they were rejecting it but if I want to appeal I should email them back with copies of my payslips, bank statement and credit report from feb to may 2019, the bank statements and payslips are easy enough to get but how do I go about getting a copy of my credit report for those dates, when I log into creditkarma or totallymoney I cant see an option to go back to 2019, im a little confused about how im supposed to do this, any idea?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Your current credit report will do. But it is hard to email credit karma – I suggest getting your statutory report from TransUnion instead https://www.transunionstatreport.co.uk/CreditReport/AboutYou
Gintare says
hello who can help me?
my husband take a loan from loan2go of £ 1000 he has been paying £ 300 for three years, paid over £ 3000 and he still needs to pay. what to do?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
is this a logbook loan on his car?
Dave R says
Where a successful un-affordability claim is concerned – what’s the rule with removing adverse marks vs deleting a loan in it’s entirety from credit reports?
Lending Stream partially upheld my claim deleted adverse marks from my final loan with them – whereas others have deleted the loan entirely. Do I have any hope of getting them to remove the loan entirely?
If they refused to remove it and parrot some FCA phrasing at me – could I raise as a dispute and request CRAs to delete it?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
FOS doesn’t usually say a lender has to removed the loan unless there have been a lot of unaffordable loans, in which cases it sometimes suggests the later ones should be deleted.
The CRAs will do what the lender says.
John Michael says
Hi Dave,
I have also made an affordability claim against lending stream (only last week). I was hoping they would clear the loans from my report in their entirety but doesn’t look hopeful given some of their responses. Could you confirm the timescales in terms of them responding to you with regards intimation of claim to offer and the frequency of your loans over time to give me a gauge as to manage my expectations a little for my own claim … thanks
Sara (Debt Camel) says
No, they won’t. And there is no reason why they should.
John Michael says
Ok , Wasn’t sure as other myjar and safety net have confirmed they are doing so. Lending stream seem to be not as hospitable then
Sara (Debt Camel) says
some companies take an easy short cut, others follow the rules.
ALAN says
hi, trying to download a copy of my transunion statutory credit report, I cant find an option to do it though, anyone successfully done this recently? I googled it and apparently theres supposed to be a “print now” button you can click and save a copy of the report as a PDF as shown in the youtube link below but there is no “print now” button now
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kDMcURHfKT8&feature=emb_logo
Jonny says
Hello. On my credit file I still have £200 outstanding from a loan that was 3 years old and fully paid off – the company was called Fancy a Payday. I believe they trade as Response Funding and or THL but neither are responding to my emails. I can prove it was paid off and I really want this removing from my credit file or marked as paid like it should be. How can I do this if they won’t reply? Or does anyone have any contact details for “fancy a payday” by any chance?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Fancy a payday was a brand name of Response Funding Ltd. The company was dissolved in 2019.
You should ask each of the credit reference agencies the loan appears on (check all three, see https://debtcamel.co.uk/best-way-to-check-credit-score/) to either correct the detail to say the loan is settled or to “supress” the loan if they cannot get the lender to agree as the lender has been dissolved. Send the CRA a formal complaint if they refuse.
Dave R says
Hi John,
They were quite quick in all honesty, think I had a final response within 1 week and my claim was partially upheld. I had three loans with them over the course of 18 months. Loan 2 was taken out about 2 months after Loan 1 and I was paying both off at the same time. Loan 3 was taken a few months after Loan 2 was cleared.
Lending Stream agreed that they shouldn’t have given me loan 3 but didn’t feel anything was wrong with loans 1 & 2. They offered to refund around £600 and remove adverse marks from loan 3. The refund came through within 48 hours after accepting their offer and credit file was updated within the promised 45 day period.
However, this was one of the first final responses I had and I was quite naive in accepting it almost straight away. Their speed made me accept it more quickly than I should have done. In hindsight, I wish I’d taken the time to look into what they offered me properly and taken the case to the FOS. Read all the articles and as many comments on DebtCamel as you can – there’s so much amazing advice here from Sara and the community. I haven’t accepting anything else straight away since and have had much better results.
John Michael says
Hi Dave,
Thanks for responding that has been very helpful indeed. Yes Sara is doing a great job here! Excellent support community she has created with her advice and expertise.
Thanks
Lynne says
Guys – Mr Lender has concluded that they don’t believe they lent to me irresponsibly and they’ve offered me a ‘goodwill gesture’ of a £25 Amazon or Tesco voucher?? Hahaha! What? Has anyone else had this?? If anything I’d have just preferred the £25 especially as I’m now out of work!
Do you think I’m within my rights to ask for the £25? In fact cash4unow gave me £25 back AND the total loan that I borrowed so I got £280 from them as a ‘goodwill gesture’ which I was really pleased with as I’d only borrowed from them once.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
How many loans were there and much interest did you pay on the loans?
Lynne says
I’m checking that with them now although I’ve a feeling the amount borrowed (3 in total) was around £600 each.
This is a direct quote from part of their email
Between your first and second loan there was a significant time period of 963 days and 554 days between your second and third loans being approved. Therefore, you did not trigger any concerns to display to us that you were reliant on short term borrowing.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
ok, so for small numbers of loans the size of each loan and the gap between paying off one and taking the next matter.
Unless you think that is wrong then you would be VERY unlikely to win a complaint at the ombudsman.
I doubt they will give you £25 in cash. A £25 voucher costs them less than that… But you could ask.
Carol h says
Hi, has anyone ever had a redress from one loan or any dealings with cash converters. I had a £1000 loan from cash converters as a one off, paying back £1999.99 I put in an affordability complaint and tomorrow is their 8 weeks, already thinking if they come back not up holding, would it be worth going to the FOS.
Thanks for any advice
Carol h says
Update: I hadn’t had a reply so I emailed to query this as it’s 8 weeks today, I sent the complaint 23rd Dec I then got an email asking for address etc then I got a copy of the loan information and a further email 4 Jan with an acknowledgement letter attached showing their complaints procedure. They have responded today saying they have until 1 March to give me a reply because they work from the date on the acknowledgement letter… So even though I’m expecting nothing it’s still annoying to have it dragged out even longer.
Carol h says
Update on this cash converter claim.
They replied today upholding the complaint and a refund of £1063.99.
I really didn’t expect this as I had only one loan with them albeit a large one.
Once again this page has been invaluable in your advise.
Thank you
Lynne says
Does anyone know, if you partially settled a loan does that render you ineligible for any unaffordability claim or redress? Ferratum told me that as I accepted a reduced settlement figure to close the loan that I wouldn’t be entitled to anything. I did a similar thing with 247 moneybox so if it they’re going to tell me the same thing
then I won’t pursue it.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Ferratum told me that as I accepted a reduced settlement figure to close the loan that I wouldn’t be entitled to anything.
was this after you had complained?
Lynne says
I settled it last September and complained in January. Only because that’s when I raised a complaint with every lender basically.
That was their response after I complained
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Well Ferratum are wrong. Because you settled early, you paid less interest but you are still entitled to a refund of that interest if your affordability complaint was upheld.
Was this your only loan from them? How large was it?
Lynne says
It was relatively small I think £100. They said if I paid £16.80 (presumably the interest?) they’d close the loan. I was so desperate just to clean up my credit file as I was applying for jobs where they looked at such things, so I settled it.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
then you have no realistic chance of winning that affordability complaint. But it has nothing to do with the fact you settled it early.
Lynne says
Yes I had around 3 or 4 loans with 247 with small gaps between around £350 each.
They’re just about tne only people who haven’t responded at all to my unaffordability claim.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
that is pretty marginal to win a FOS complaint. My guess is 247 administrators may well reject the claim.
Lynne says
I have another problem. United Kash have suddenly started demanding a loan I owe from different money which I took out in November 2014. Can they legally do that after more than 6 years? I’ve had no contact with anyone since 2014 about this. It’s just typical they’ve appeared after all this time when I’m out of work. I don’t know how to reply so thought I’d get some advice first.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Talk to National Debtline on 0808 808 4000 about whether this may be statute barred.
I also think you should also talk through your whole situation with them. The debt you are being taken to court for, other old debts that haven’t been repaid etc. From what you have said you have used a lot of different high cost credit lenders a few times. This means you are unlikely to get good refunds, especially as many have gone under already.
I think you should consider if a debt relief order would be a good way forward for you – National Debtline can explain this and the pors and cons.
John Michael says
I have just received an offer in from lending stream- below-.My view is that in terms of proximity loans 5 and 6 should also be refunded also-would you agree?
We have decided to uphold your complaint and offer a refund to you of £119.48.
Loan Number Loan account number Amount borrowed Date the loan was made
1 5378734 £400.00 2018-04-25
2 5576599 £700.00 2018-08-08
3 5615074 £850.00 2018-08-25
4 5718509 £1010.00 2018-10-14
5 6054316 £1400.00 2019-05-18
6 6066545 £1100.00 2019-05-27
7 6086546 £500.00 2019-06-09
8 6114912 £500.00 2019-06-29
Our decision
For loans 1 to 6, the money that you had available after your expenses were subtracted was more than the amount needed to pay us each month and would still have left you with some money to spend on other things. This means that these loans were affordable.
Although loans 7 to 8 were affordable, we have thought about the number of loans and the time that passed between each loan being opened. We can see that it might not have been a good idea for us to make these loans.
So, we are partially agreeing to your complaint
To put things right, we’d like to take the following steps
• We’ll refund the interest and fees you have paid us for loans 7 to 8
• We’ll pay an extra 8% simple interest on this amount
• We’ll withhold 20% of this additional 8% interest amount because Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs (HMRC) tell us we must do this
• We’ll check this refund amount (after HMRC withholding) against any outstanding balances you have with us
• We’ll give you a certificate of the tax we have withheld for use in any discussions with HMRC if required
• We’ll remove any adverse marks we have left on your credit file at the CRA for loans 7 to 8
Sara (Debt Camel) says
what date did loan 4 end?
John Michael says
I paid back loan 4 on 26/10/18 at £1106.96 .at that time I had a myjar loan being paid out my account the next day 26/10/18 at £256.56 and also an everyday lending loan £298 on the same day as lending stream at 25/10/18 .
Thanks
Sara (Debt Camel) says
” also an everyday lending loan £298 on the same day as lending stream at 25/10/18 ”
is that LS loan on the list???
John Michael says
Apologies the lending stream loan 4 was paid back on 26/10/18 in full at £1106.96 . That same month a day before the lending stream loan 4 was paid on 25/10/18 I also paid everyday loans their monthly payment of £298 .I also had a separate loan with myjar at the same time that I paid £256.56 towards on 25/10/18 . The other two may not be relevant just thought I would flag it up to show I had another pay day loan and a high interest loan when paying back lending streams loan
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Then from LS point of view there was a gap of more than 6 months between loan 4 and loan 5.
But depite the long gap it is possible you would get 5 refunded at FOS because it is larger.
It is also possible you could get loan 4 refunded at FOS.
John Michael says
Ok thanks I checked my bank details and it’ seems I had money in from lending stream for 5 and then 6 without anything paid back albeit only for a day so May have been case pay the loan 5 and get loan 6 almost straightaway with the banking days causing both payments to be in without money showing the other way. I then paid loan 6 within 4 weeks.
In terms of them stating …We’ll remove any adverse marks we have left on your credit file at the CRA for loans 7 to 8….. would this be the loans in their entirety and searches for loans 7&8 ?
Lastly is it worth going back and confirming if they included 4,5 and 6 or is this a waste of time ?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
that is a good reason why loan 6 should be refunded.
I don’t see any point in going back to LS and offering to settle for 4-8. If you want to offer a compromise it has to be less than the most you are likely to get from FOS. You could offer 6-8…
If they say no you have to choose between a poor offer in cash now or going to FOS.
LS would not remove the loans, only missed payments or defaults.
John michael says
Ok thanks I will go back and offer 6-8 on basis believe can obtain 4-8 with FOS, time wise with FOS to investigate and provide decision upwards of 8 weeks I take it?
Thanks for all help here
Sara (Debt Camel) says
yes, they don’t normally negotiate but you may feel it’s worth a try.
Dave R says
Another Lending Stream query:
For the loan where they have removed the missed payment/adverse information, it has the date settled as “June 2020″* when it should read September 2018 if in line with original agreement. They have agreed they never should have given me this loan. So whilst there’s no missed payment marker, under closer scrutiny it still looks like a very late settlement. For mortgage purposes this makes it look like the loan was a lot more recent than it actually was. Since they won’t remove the loan can I ask them to change the date?
*for context. Lending Stream didn’t take the final payment of £100 when they were supposed to and I never realised and they never chased me up for it It was only when I was trying to turn my finances around last year that I discovered an open loan with them – which I settled as soon as I saw.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
I think you can ask them to do this. Send the complaint to the Ombudsman if they refuse.
Dave R says
As expected, they aren’t agreeing to make the edit and are repeating the same phrase at me. I think this is disgusting to be honest. It doesn’t impact them in anyway to make the change and is perfectly fair. FOS it is then!
Sara (Debt Camel) says
The point to stress to FOS is not that the loan was unaffordable but it was LS’s fault that they did not take the last payment.
Dave R says
Hi Sara,
Had a good result with this, after a lot of emails and lots of back and forth, Lending Stream have agreed to change the settlement date on that loan to September 2018 (to reflect original agreement) rather than June 2020. They were refusing at first, and kept repeating the same FCA phrasing at me.
I kept challenging them and probably replied so many times that they’ve decided to see sense. Really wasn’t expecting them to u-turn like this, lovely surprise for a Friday!
Thanks for your help
Tom says
I put in an affordability complaint a few weeks ago to moneyboat, got a reply from them last week with their final response rejecting my claim, I emailed them back (thurs 11th) with further information to appeal before going to the ombudsman, haven’t received anything in response since, should I just go ahead and open a dispute with the ombudsman now? if moneyboat were to reply following this changing their minds I could then just cancel the dispute with the ombudsman?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
I suggest phoning them up tomorrow and saying your case goes to FOS on Friday if they haven’t responded.
JP says
Hi,
Has anyone had their uncle buck redress paid? The email said that:
Payment of the above cash refund will be made to you upon conclusion of the overall Redress exercise for all customers, which is anticipated to be completed in the week ended 19 February 2021. You may therefore expect to receive payment as soon as possible thereafter. Payments will be referenced as ‘Uncle Buck’.
Wonder if anyone has been paid out yet given tomorrow is the deadline?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
This is a refund of payments you made after administration?
JP says
Hi Sara,
When UB went in to administration, my claim was assessed by the appointed administrator. Whilst my claim was to be higher, they have provided me with an redress amount which is significantly lower
I understand that redress payments are to commence from 22nd Feb onwards.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
If your loans have been repaid, the administrators have warned that there will be no cash for distribution.
Susan says
Has anyone made affordability claims while on a debt management plan?
Will it not effect my plan for example if I cant afford my DMP amount each month and they make new offers to my creditors, what I mean is Will it leave a black mark against my name
Sara (Debt Camel) says
yes! If you win the complaint your DMP is going to finish much sooner.
I think you should make claims if you feel the loans were unaffordable and lead to you needing more credit and the DMP.
It won’t work against you with your creditors, they know they are already being paid as much as you can afford.
Susan says
I recieved this UB email this morning asking for bank details but reading the comment looks like we might not be getting anything
Chantal says
Hi,
I’ve received an email this week from SafetyNetCredit confirming a redress of £1868after using your email template, thank you! I used the same email to make a claim with Bamboo Loans for the same time period and a similar amount of borrowing which was rolled over, with a top up loan. They’ve rejected my claim, should I go back to them and tell them I’ve had another claim upheld or go straight to the Ombudsman?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Bamboo probably won’t care about that.
You could offer a compromise, to say you would accept less than all the interest back? But if you want the full refund you may as well send this to FOS now.
Paul H says
Hi Chantal,
Firstly congratulations on the redress offer from Safety Net Credit, if you don’t mind me asking how long ago did you submit your complaint with them before they answered. Did they make you wait the full 8 weeks and did they ask you for any evidence before they made you the offer or did they just go off the vast number of times you borrowed from your limit. Thanks for any help you could give.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
You shouldn’t have to send SNC extra info as they could see your bank statements.
Do you still owe them money?
Paul H says
No finished a payment plan with them end of 2018 but asked because started with them early 2013 (so almost 8 years ago). Went in payment plan 2014. Then 3 months later they gave me limit of £500 plus again and kept increasing it, so payment plan again 4 months after that (in 2nd payment plan for over a year till Feb 17). Then gave me £500 plus limit again 2 months later and ended up in 3rd payment plan till 2018. I was living and working abroad for all so had no wages going in but did have £7000 incomings and outgoings each month with all pay day lenders & friends etc borrowing me.
I do have a question Sara, I got a notification from Credit Karma this weekend to say something new had been added to my report, when I looked it said Safety Net Credit had reactivated my account and was it me? When I logged into dashboard on SNC it does still say account closed with them and to re-open to ring them. I just thought it was too much of a coincidence that I put in a complaint with them just over 2 weeks ago and then get the notification to say account re-opened. It shows balance zero so don’t think it will have a negative impact but don’t know why they’d reopen it without me even asking.
Dave R says
Hi Paul,
From my side, Lending Stream took 6 weeks to issue me with a final response. Full redress payment of just over £5k which was amazing. And the money was in my account within 7 days. Removed from my credit file within 30 days. I didn’t need to send them anything other than the initial complaint email.
I looked through their letter and checked the amount in terms of whether it was accurate and it was pretty bang on. I wish they were all this easy to deal with!
Chantal says
Hi Paul, they got back within 3.5 weeks, they said that they realised that they had overlent and repaid within 2 days. I didn’t supply the details of individual transactions (I’m not even sure I could have kept track of them)
Paul H says
Thanks Chantal, since I wrote the message on here I was able to log into the SNC website and although it says my account is closed it still allowed me to view all the statements with them even dating back to 2013 so it shows all the transactions and interest paid. I am writing that because it may help others if they don’t know what they borrowed with them.
Good to here they repaid so quick. In truth both Ferratum and Mr Lender once I agreed to the redress offer refunded back to my bank account within 24 hours. Like someone else wrote on here Ferratum was willing to compromise and up their initial offer so for anyone reading these comments it’s worth going back to Ferratum if you don’t agree with their first offer.
Back to SNC like I mentioned above I still wouldn’t know why SNC would re-open my account on my credit file since I sent my complaint without me even asking, it’s been closed since 2018
Dave L says
Escalate the bamboo loan to the ombudsman, they rejected my complaint outright yet rolled over as seen as an adjudicator found in my favour removing over £4500 in interest
Alan says
Hi Chantal,
How long did it take to get your response from safetynetcredit after sending in the affordability complaint?
Chantal says
4 weeks from the date of complaint, and they transferred the money 48hrs later
Lee says
how long after acceptance do satsuma take to pay out?
JaneC says
Hi Lee
Satsuma accepted my adjudicators findings on 4th Feb. I received a letter from them on 13th Feb listing what they were going to pay and said a cheque would be sent within 14 days. Not received it yet.
Dave R says
When did you submit your claim to the FOS Jane?
I sent mine in early January. I know that they’ve reached out to Satsuma but I’ve not heard a peep for a while now… am aware it will take a long time…
JaneC says
I submitted it to FOS in March last year!! Satsuma delayed at every opportunity and used Covid as an excuse in my opinion. My adjudicator asked them to provide the credit checks on my 7 loans. They sent them through in dribs and drabs which meant she had to keep going back to them. Because of the pandemic the FOS are giving them longer than normal to provide the information which I understand but when they are requesting the same information I didn’t agree they should be given longer.
Liza says
Hi, I submitted a complaint 1st Feb 2020. They didn’t accept my complaint and it was sent to FOS they have continued to drag their feet with providing the FOS with full details. 2nd February they had provided all details then on the 5th I was advised they’d accepted the findings of FOS however would contact myself with an offer. I was advised I needed to let the FOS know by 19th Feb. No response received. Contacted Satsuma to be told they have 28 days and wouldn’t respond until then. I expect another 28 days after that. Appalling service unless they are persuading you to take loans out.
JaneC says
FYI my cheque arrived today so only took a week after their letter.
Lynne says
Peachy have confirmed that I am due a redress of £467 but that I’m likely to get less than 2% of that!
Simon says
Morning
Just wondered if anyone has received a redress from Lending Stream recently or even heard from them for that matter?
I’ve been waiting for them to make contact since the FOS ruled in my favour back in November but I’ve not even been asked for my bank details yet to arrange the refund.
I can’t get hold of anyone on the phone, the live chat is a joke and although the FOS have chased it up for me a few times Lending Stream seem to be ignoring them as well now.
If anyone’s had a similar experience I’d be interested to know how you handled it? Many thanks.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
LS accepted the adjudicator decision?
If they have, 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.
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 Credit (689378) trading as Lending Stream have not refunded me after 3 months
Say that LS have agreed to refund you following a FOS decision on dd/mm/yy which LS accepted, attach the email confirming this. But you have still not be paid despite you contacting them numerous times, the phone isn’t answeres, the live chat is hopeless and there is no email for you to use. 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.
Simon says
Brilliant, I’ll get onto that now. Thank you.
Tom says
Hi Simon
Has this yielded any results?
I’m having a problem with LS at the moment, and they are in fact lying to me. Their recent position has been that they need confirmation from the FOS before they can process the redress, and that they haven’t got that. They do have it, have had it for some time and I have a copy of it!
Aaron says
Hi Sara,
I received an email from Uncle Buck (their administrators anyway) yesterday confirming I am due a redress of £305.24. I provided my bank details, however I have seen some comments on here saying there’s no money to be paid?
I fall into Category 1, will i get paid? if so do you know when at all?
Many Thanks
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Category 1 – so you have been making payments since administration started to a debt which the administrators have decided is unaffordable? How much have you paid since then to this debt?
(This is NOT the same as the redress for unaffordable lending.)
Aaron says
Hi Sara,
I paid off the remainder of my loan (£305.24) in full back in April 2020. The email states that I am entitled to redress, and it has been upheld at the value of £305.24 and “This represents the final amount due to you. There will be no further re-assessment”
Many Thanks
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Then that was a payment after UB went into administration, you are in category 1 and you should get the whole amount back.
Aaron says
Brilliant, thanks for clarifying Sara!
It says to expect soon as possible after week ending the 19th Feb, so should I expect payment before the end of the month do you think?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
honestly I wouldn’t count on it. I hope it will come by then but don’t plan everything around it.
Peter says
Hello all,
I had a loan balance with Uncle Buck. It was sold on to Lantern and I pay them monthly. However, I have now received an email confirming that my affordability complaint against Uncle Buck has been upheld, and a small redress payment will be made. The debt entry cleared from credit reference records.
Does this development have any effect on my remains balance being collected by Lantern? Is it enforceable? Remaining balance is a touch over £400
Regards Peter
Sara (Debt Camel) says
How large was this loan originally? How much had you paid to UB or to Lantern?
Peter says
The loan was for £600. Total repayable £900 or thereabouts. The balance was approx £470 when Lantern took it. I am only paying them £5 per month presently.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
So you had paid UB about £430 when the loan was sold? How long have you been repaying Lantern?
Peter says
6 months approximately.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
OK, then I suggest you email Lantern and explain the the UB administrators have determined that the loan that was sold to Lantern had been missold. Ask Lantern to:
– remove the default and any negative information from your credit record for this loan
– say you have paid £430 to UB when the loan was sold and £30 to lantern so far, so ask Lantern to reduce your balance to 600 – 430 – 30 = 140.
– say you will carry on paying this reduced balance at £5 a month.
I don’t know what they will reply.
Dave R says
Question re SwiftSterling/MMP Financial:
They rejected my dispute about a month or so ago but I found the decision after the appeals deadline as it went into my junk (which I do also check religiously, not sure how I missed it). I’ve contacted them twice since outside of the 21 day appeal deadline and they have just completely ignored me. All I want is missed payments removed from my credit file to be honest. Is it worth raising a dispute with Transunion as chances are nobody will respond to them and they may then suppress the account information?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Well you can try TransUnion – say you have been trying to get a reply from the administrators but they aren’t answering, so you would like the record supressed..
Dave R says
Interestingly, this disappeared from my Transunion report yesterday. I’ve had nothing back from TU to say they’ve removed or suppressed it in line with the dispute. I had to send the dispute through manually by email and it only got passed to the right team 1 week ago. Pretty sure they would take the full 28 days before suppressing it so not sure if the administrators have been updating credit records? Thrilled it’s gone though!
hugo says
Hi, wonder if you could assist. I have had a refund of £50 from an original refund value of just over 2k from Wage day Advance. Were they supposed to have deleted the refs to it on my Transunion report as it still shows 5 loans. All paid of course. How long do i expect these to be deleted? I have emailed the Recievers but have had no response so far. Any ideas?
Also applied for two more refunds from Pounds till payday and quick quid and pounds to pocket.
I notice you can apply for tax refunds from payday loan redress’s is this correct? If so what do i need to send to HMRC?
Thank you
Hugo
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Yes those loans should have been deleted. You now need to contact the Credit Reference Agency where the problem is showing – Experian, Equifax or TransUnion. Say you can no longer get an answer from the administrators so you would like the CRA to “suppress” the following credit records as they are inaccurate. If they refuse, send the CRA a formal complaint and this can be sent to the Financial Ombudsman.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
re tax deduction. There wouldn’t have been any for refunds where the company was in administration.
Tom says
Hi,
Just wondered if anyone has complained to fernovo and if so how did you get on? Are they one of “the better” ones to complain to?
Paul says
They are horrible Tom. Sent me a long winded reply full of rubbish and offering me £60 redress… I knew I had a strong case due to reading this site so persisted with threatening to take to the FOS… they then upped there offer to £120.. then £300 then £350 then eventually the full £437. Be persistant with them and dont give in!
Lynne says
When a complaint is escalated to the ombudsman is it the case they need to see old bank statements etc? My loans are so old and for relatively small amounts that I think maybe it’s not worth the hassle going down this route.. can anyone convince me otherwise?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
How much hassle us it to ask your bank for old statements? If you are making several FOS complaints over the same period, your statements only need to be supplied once.
But what matters is how many loans you had from each lender and whether there were gaps between them. If you want to win cases with a small number of loans from that lender it really helps to have those bank statements.
Frank says
Hi,
I’m just wondering if anyone would have any idea on the general wait time on complaints being investigated atm with the FOS. I obviously understand with Covid 19 situation they will be longer than normal?
I have a complaint in with the FOS against Satsuma. Received an email back from the FOS on 20th of November 2020, saying they have asked satsuma for information about my complaint and asking for more information from me. I sent the information they asked and received an email back on 9th December 2020 , saying this had been received.
Hadn’t heard any update so I contacted FOS at the start of February to see if there was any update.
I got a reply back on the 10th of February saying the business had responded to their reply for information and my complaint was waiting to be investigated.
So just wondering does anyone have a rough idea on how long I will have to wait?
Thanks.
Mike says
Just had a response back from my initial email to Moneyboat, requesting that I send them bank statements. Do I need to do this, and can they refuse it if I don’t? Also they were threatening to report me for fraud but it seems this is just a tactic to throw people off.
Is there a structured response I can send to their request?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
How many loans did you have from them and how large?
Mike says
7 loans between June 2017 and June 2019, mostly £200, one £300 and £400
I should point out, I have already supplied my credit file to them as part of the initial contact
Sara (Debt Camel) says
yes their threats of reporting from fraud seem designed to get people to drop their complaints.
I don’t know if they actually look at bank statements – asking for them may just be another way to try to put people off – but it’s worth sending them
Xubo says
Anyone has there money from uncle buck yet
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Are you expecting a refund of interest?
Xubo says
Has anyone had success in claiming back from satsuma? I’ve had two loans with them at the same time one for £700 and one for £400 both at the same time, which I struggled to pay
I’m in a dmp and they are one of my creditors
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Yes! Together that is a lot of money. Even if you only get a refund for the second loan that would speed up your DMP.
Xubo says
Thank you ill get on to it
Andy says
12 months and waiting not a peep so don’t hold out much hope of anything speedy. Joke really.
Xubo says
Yes they asked for my bank details on Thursday and said I was due £205
James says
Payments from Uncle Buck will be made on the week commencing 8th March
Xubo says
Ah ok, I thought the way the emailed was worded I’d maybe get before then
Thank you for the response
Holly D says
Hi Sara,
My bank recently provided me with paper copies of my transactions for 2011 – 2013 inclusive. In among these transactions were amounts received from Minicredit Ltd, Mem Consumer Finance, and Cash on Go. Can you confirm if any of these companies are still operating?
Thank you.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Minicredit – long gone
Mem Consumer Finance was a brand name of Payday UK – now in a Scheme where the deadline to make a claim has passed
Cash on Go – that was Peachy, now in administration and the deadline for making claims has passed.
Holly D says
Thank you Sara
Lynne says
Does anyone know when Different Money cease trading please?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Company was dissolved in 2018
JR says
Anyone got any successful irresponsible lending claims from Vanquis card?
I lodged a complaint last month to them about increased credit limit from £250 to £1500 when I was a student/newly graduated and got myself into financial trouble – this was back around 2012. Was eventually sent to a debt recovery agency and paid back a few years later.
I submitted the same complaint to Very and got £4,477.77 back, so I’m wondering if Vanquis are as acknowledging?
Lynne says
I had no luck at all with Vanquis sorry.
Joseph says
Yes JR, I did back in 2019. I found them (out of the 3 different credit cards I was complaint to (Vanquies, Aqua & Capital One) to be the easiest. That said they of course rejected my complaint and took it to the ombudsman, but they accepted the adjudicators decision and it didn’t have to go the ombudsman. Back in 2019 though, they use the refund to close my account (balance of £500) owing. I found it a little strange how the exact refund could have been £500 exactly and called them up to ask for total interest paid + charges to be calculated and they sent me additional cheque of £144 as well, so make sure their calculations are spot on. Good luck ! Joseph.
Joseph says
Hello Mike, Money Boat (for me) were probably the most difficult and rudest lender I dealt with. Rejected everything right up until Ombudsman forced them to make things right. Stick with it, and good luck! Ignore the empty threats like Sara said.
Mike says
OK, thanks for the feedback Joseph. I most certainly will be pushing them until I get and outcome, and I’m prepared to play hardball. If their emails are as nasty as the first one, I may consider a further complaint about their conduct once I’ve got the main issue sorted. On the plus side, I sent a number of emails at the same time to various companies and Piggybank came back to me and offered to refund everything (shame I’ll probably see less than £100, but its better than nothing I guess)
mike says
So I got back some interest from a couple of years ago, but the FOS said I could only go back 6 years.
This meant I missed out on additional refunds.
I notice that they now say “or within 3 years from which you could have reasonably known.” so does this now mean I could have gone back further?
If so, I don’t think this is fair.
Why does someone who complains now suddenly get the extra years?
Sara, could you explain this process please to clear things up maybe?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
How long ago was this refund? Who was the lender?
mike says
I won the case in 2017 but the loans Uncle bucks) were from 2006-2014 but the FOS said I couldn’t have refunds for 2011-2014 as they could only go back 6 years, but now people can go back 9 years can’t they?
I remember at the time there was much discussion as to why the FOS couldn’t come to a decision as to which it was, so I am a bit perturbed that decide now that you can go back as long as you want as long as you didn’t know you could claim until recently.
Is that about right?
Is there anything I can do about the case?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
did you ask for the decision about the older loans to go to an ombudsman or did you accept the adjudicator decision?
mike says
I accepted the decision that I couldn’t claim for the older loans as I didn’t know any different. I thought that was the way things were. Nobody mentioned that I could question this decision.
The adjudicators decision about the claim in general I asked for an Ombudsman final decision which went in my favour.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
I am not sure there is anything you can do.
Uncle Buck is in adminstration and there is no (zero) money to be paid out.
If you didn’t question the 6 year ruling, then the Ombudsman would not have looked at it. FOS did not issue its lead decisions on the 6 year rule until August 2018.
mike says
Well, I was always taking advice from this site and I can’t remember you saying that it was an option to dispute the 6 year ruling?
But anyway, if Uncle Bucks is in admin, it’s not worth it.
But I was just wondering your advice for others in the same position, who were all told they couldn’t do this until August 2018, don’t you think it quite unfair for them?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
You didn’t ask about this in 2016 when your UB refund was, you didn’t mention older loans were been disregarded.
If you had, this was a typical reply I was giving in 2016: https://debtcamel.co.uk/quickquid-payday-loan-refunds/comment-page-1/#comment-204233
The first indication that loans over 6 years would be looked at was November 2016. But that was only an adjudicator decision and many cases remained on hold for nearly 2 years until the FOS lead decisions were issued in summer 2018, when the cases on hold then started to go through.
While cases were on hold I typically said that if people only had a few older loans they should consider saying they would like them disregarded to get a faster decision. eg https://debtcamel.co.uk/asking-wonga-refund/comment-page-1/#comment-218120
Xubo says
This might be the wrong page but if a put a complaint I against Very and littlewoods do I have to do each catalogue separate when tho thee kinda the same Company
Sara (Debt Camel) says
This is the better page https://debtcamel.co.uk/refunds-catalogue-credit-card/
Lynne says
I just heard from the Ombudsman that as 247 moneybox are in administration they can’t look into unaffordable lending on my behalf and that I need to contact the administrators directly. Just in case anyone was waiting for news on that one.
Chris says
The 247 Moneybox Administrators contacted me and gave me what they said was an automatically calculated redress claim. They used some kind kind of algorithm based system to work it out.
The calculation was just under £600 but as ever, they said it’s extremely unlikely that I will get all of that. I understand that but it would be nice if they gave us some date for when we will get it, whatever ‘it’ is rather than stuff like “possibly the second quarter of the year” or something like that, which leaves too wide a scope to be of any use.
Lynne says
Oh right thanks. Do you have an email address for the administrators please? Only when I went to 247 website it still just says to contact to them via their own customer service email address and given the fact they’re no longer trading I’m not expecting a very quick response (if any!).
Chris says
As far as I know, you should be able to contact the administrators on the SAME email that is on there customer.services@247moneybox.com and phone number 0207 183 8078, as they have taken it all over.
Adele says
Hi has anybody had a loan from Loans to go (prac financial)
Can this be claimed against for irresponsible lending?
I don’t know how I got this loan I think it was through cash panda.
I put my details in the site and the interest seemed low next min I had £500 in my bank and the email said a higher Apr. I didn’t get the choice of how long I wanted to pay back and within minutes I owed a total of £1980. I tried to cancel this but for some reason I couldn’t,. Now the debt has been sold on to bw legal.
Thanks in advance
Sara (Debt Camel) says
yes, lots of success against L2G.
See the special page on these horrible loans which has a template for complaints about them: https://debtcamel.co.uk/worst-loan-in-britain/
Steve says
Does anyone have a estimated time of an FOS adjudicator picking up a complaint?
Got an update this week stating they’ve got all the information they need about my loans from the company and it was just waiting to be investigated now.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
who is the lender?
Steve says
The loans are with satsuma. 9 in total.
Chris says
I had 9 loans with satsuma as well but after a long long process I got a letter from satsuma today saying they are refunding me £5285 and my check will be with me within the next 2 weeks
Angela says
Yes was told that 12monthd ago been waiting 18, month s for ombudsman to get back in touch
Sara (Debt Camel) says
For satsuma refunds, see https://debtcamel.co.uk/provident-satsuma-scheme/
A few FOS decisions are being accepted, but if your complaint is not yet being worked on, you should assume it will have to go into the Scheme if that gets approved.
Do you still owe money on this?
Chris says
No I owe nothing to them
Angela says
No none whatever been paid up infill and never missed a payment because agent was a bully took out a step management plan so that l could pay priority bills .
Eve says
Hi –
A quick question – how I get credit reports for Credit Karma & Equifax – FOS is asking for copy
Sara (Debt Camel) says
See https://debtcamel.co.uk/best-way-to-check-credit-score/ and get the statutory reports for TransUnion and Equifax.
Dave R says
Question for anybody that’s had pay day loans “supressed” from their credit reports by a lender. I understand that other companies/future lenders searching on your report would not be able to see the supressed information – but can you still see it on your report yourself? I’m waiting for this to take effect with ELEVATE on my Transunion reports. Will probably push back and try and ask them to remove entirely like Experian have done but am just wondering…
Tyrone R says
Just get it removed completly if you can.
Peter McVeigh says
Hi Dave,
I would be interested to know what you put in the complaint bit to get these loans surprised, I have many elevate loans on my file, that i have complained directly to them about but now they are closed down i can’t get them to update my credit file?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Read https://debtcamel.co.uk/correct-credit-records-lender-administration/ and the comments below there.
Cira says
Hi Sara I have noticed a default from different money limited from 2016 – I have tried Googling but can’t find anything about them at all do you know if they changed name?
Thanks!
Sara (Debt Camel) says
They were previously called My Mate? But they went bust a while ago.
Cira says
Hi Sara thanks – would I not be able to do anything about that default if they have gone bust? :(
Sara (Debt Camel) says
If you think it is wrong, you can ask the credit reference agencies it is showing on (check all 3, Experian, Equifax and TransUnion) to “suppress” the record.. Say you are unable to ask the lender to correct it as they no longer exist.
When a record is suppressed no one else can see it.
If the CRA refuses, send them a formal complaint and take the case to the Ombudsman.
Cira says
Hi Sara I’ve just realised I actually ended up paying the balance to united kash (debt collector on behalf of them – could I send my complaint to them if different money are nowhere to be seen?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
if there is a default on a credit record where the creditor is Different Money corrected, it is not going to be any help at all to complain to a debt collector they used at the time. The debt collector was an agent of Different Money. They were nor responsible for maintaining Different Money’s credit records. You need to go to the Credit Reference Agency.
Lynne says
Hi Cira sorry to jump in. I was contacted recently by someone called United Kash who said they were acting on behalf of different Money. I took out the loan in 2014 with no contact since so it came as a surprise. I’ve changed address and also email my address since then so I’ve no idea what methods these people use to track people down but I’ve complained to them about their harassing way.
Cira says
Hi lynne thank you! I will try them & hope you get yours sorted too! X
KGLA says
Hello Sara
Thank you for this site I have found it invaluable sorting this out.
I have had a full and final response from Lending Stream about my 6 loans, now as you will see none of these has been paid of fully as stopped making payments in 2018 as I was robbing peter to pay paul.
Their final response is:-
KGLA says
Their response is that they will refund loans 5&6
but this line makes no sense to me:-
We have worked out a net refund on these loans of £0.00 (£0.00 for Interest paid, £0.00 for Fees paid, £0.00 for 8% annual interest calculated for upheld loans, minus £0.00 for 20% mandatory tax withholding in line with HMRC regulations.)
We can see that there is an outstanding balance of £160.00. When we subtract that from the amount, we’re offering to pay you, there’s an amount which you will need to pay us of £160.00. This doesn’t include any balances that are currently being held by debt collection agencies.
Now all the loans are at debt collection agency anyway and the balances are:-
Loan 1 – 20/05/2018 – £200 – Oustanding – £107.52
Loan 2 – 06/07/2018 – £70 – Oustanding – £70.36
Loan 3 – 20/07/2018 – £50 – Outstanding – £65.40
Loan 4 – 01/08/2018 – £100 – Outstanding – £135.94
Loan 5 – 14/10/2018 – £110 – Outstanding – £220
Loan 6 – 18/10/2018 – £50 – Oustanding – £100
What do you think, I find it crazy that they gave me 5 more loans when the first one was not paid off.
I’m dyslexic so find it hard to understand but keen to get it all sorted out. I do have the money to get this paid off now but feel that I should not have to pay all this interest for there wrongdoing.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
had you missed any payments to loans 1-4 before you took out loans 5 & 6?
did you pay LS anything towards loans 5 & 6 before they were sold to the debt collector? Who is the debt collector?
How much have you paid to the debt collector for loans 5 & 6?
KGLA says
Hi Sara
Thansks for gegting back to me
I did not miss any payments before I took out loans 5 & 6, but took out loans 2-6 as was short due to the loan payments.
I have paid nothing towards 5 & 6.
Loans 1- 4 are with Lantern
Loans 5 & 6 are with Asset Collections /Perch Capital Ltd but still on credit file as Lantern.
Thanks
jijface says
Hi There
Go to the ombudsman….
I have just won a case against Lending stream…
I also got awarded £250 compensation
The only loan i didnt get refunded for was loan one…. as they did resonable checks…..after that they awarded me the rest.
Also another tip dont always go with the adjudicator……if your not happy with the amount make sure it goes to an ombudsman as i got double what the adjudicator got
hope this helps message me if you need anymore help, i have done several of these with great results.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
ok so you have two issues.
1) should LS have upheld any of the loans 1-4?
This is a bit marginal as they were all smallish. there is a case for saying they should have upheld loan 4, but I would be surprised if any of 1-3 were upheld if you go to the ombudsman. It’s up to you if you think it’s worth sending the case to the ombudsman to try to get loan 4 included.
2) what should LS be doing to sort out loan 5 & 6 which they have agreed are mis-sold?
What they should do is removed the interest so that you only repay what you borrowed. That would be 110+50=£160. they should either get the debt collector to change the balance to 110 and 50 or LS should buy back the debt from the debt collector so you repay the 160 to LS. Also they should remove the defaults from loans 5 & 6 on your credit records.
This may be what they are proposing to do, as they say you will owe them £160 at the end. But I think you need to clarify this with them.
KGLA says
Hi Sara
I just wanted to update you on this after going to the ombudsman.
They have upheld my complaint on all 6 loans, turns out they did not do proper checks and I have 8 accounts in default and a CCJ at the time of the first loan.
I can’t believe it and can’t thank you enough for this site. I still have a small balance to pay but this will be sorted in the next few months.
I also want to say how professional and helpful the ombudsman was done everything quickly and explained everything amazingly can’t thank them enough as well.
Lynne says
I have found the collections agents acting for lending stream and more so uncle buck to be particularly underhand and harassing.
JoJo says
If its the same ones that dealt with mine, very!
I had terrible issues with them, and had to complain to them as well. Glad to say i stopped dealing with them a while ago. You have to be tough and on the ball with them if its the same ones.
Mary says
Hi
Does anyone know what happened to claims made to 24/7 money box? I have gone onto the website and the redress section is no longer there but I can see that entries have been removed from my credit file.
Chris says
That’s what I’ve been wondering about too. Sarah said the redress section has disappeared because the time for people to claim is now up but I don’t know when those of us who have claims being processed will hear back from them and get paid.
Paul H says
Hi Mary,
I messaged them last week because I seen that it said that people had been told their redress amount last October to December and they had to log into their account to accept or challenge but the last contact I’d had with them was putting in a claim with their administrators and I hadn’t heard anything after that. So I asked and they said my redress had been calculated at £1100 which was the 1st I’d heard and the date to challenge it had passed (31st Jan). I did pay over £4000 in interest however after Wonga, Wage Day Advance etc and their final dividend it doesn’t make an awful lot of difference except you feel more cheated when redress amount is £3000 and you end up with about £120. Anyway they said in the email back to me that it would be between April and June when we would all hear from them next. Hope this helps.
Mary says
Thank you so much for that. I guess something is better than nothing in terms of the redress.
Lynne says
I felt the same Paul. Wonga calculated my redress at £12,800 but I walked away with £550. It was better than nothing obviously but infuriating when you think what the difference is. It’s like saying here’s what you could have won!
Jamie says
Hi all still waiting for a final response from Dot Dot Loans its the 8 week mark tomorrow. Has anyone had a upheld complaint from them?
wb says
Im looking for some advice, i had a loan with JUO a couple years ago, they sold the debt on to Shelby Finance, who have now in turn sold to Lantern .
I know Juo have gone under, but i did receive a redress, whilst in administration. What id like to know if anyone could help is, receiving a redress obviously means this loan was unaffordable and irresponsible. however im still paying Lantern. Is there anyone i can email to find out if this loan should still be paid and how i go about it?
The issue is i have had a couple of loans in the past with WagedayAdvance, which fall under the same company, so not sure which side company was a void loan as such.
Just wanted to find out if this juo loan is now void as such?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
It’s hard to guess if you don’t have the emails from the Wageday Advance administrators any more. They would have said which loans were unaffordable.
The administrators normally called back the loans from Shelby that were unaffordable. So as yours wasn’t called back, it may have been that your redress was for payday loans not the Juo loan.
Wb says
Ahh ye I see. The juo loan was actually removed from my credit report, which makes me think it was unaffordable and irresponsible. Or is that just simply because the complaint had gone bust?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Sorry, I can’t tell. And now it is too late to ask the administrators.
hugo says
have you actually paid off the Juo loan? If you have not it will be with perhaps Lantern or Shelby Finance.
Wb says
I’ve got about £300 left to pay through lantern, my issue is if that loan was deemed unaffordable, then am I obliged to pay this.
I’ve emailed lantern for information regarding it.