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?
James says
Update:
I had 3 complaints against QQ, UncleB and Pe. All three of which went to ombudsman in first week of Jan. QQ and PE tried to avoid any contact with me. UB offered 1.7k which I thought was too low.
So from last week adjudicators came back with their decisions. PE have offered a fair amount, 1k which I accepted. QQ have refused the adjudicators decision which was to refund everything after 2nd loan. And only offered refunds from 2 larger loans and not the other 20 loans I had with them. So that’s gone to ombudsman now for a final decision. Any ideas how long that process is?
UncleB have made no contact or offer yet and have yet to remove the late payment on my credit file despite my final loan being paid off in full on time.
Vic Smith says
Hiya.
I had a load of payday loans with Albermarle & Bond in 2010/11.
I wrote a letter of complaint to them about a month ago explaining the unaffordability of these,and they have come back to me saying as the new albermarle and bond is not linked to the old one,there is nothing they can do,apart from giving me the address of the administrators of the original company.
Seems a bit harsh to me.
Has anybody else had any success with Albemarle & Bond
Vic Smith
Bill says
This is correct, I’m afraid. Albermarle & Bond went bust and the company who bought them essentially got the name and some of the assets, they didn’t take on any responsibility for previous failings of the company. You can try the administrators, but if there is no money left then I’m not sure how well any claim would go even if the FO dos go in your favour. You may simply end up on a long list of creditors with every other person or company that they owed money to since they went bust.
Lefin says
Hi all,
I somehow stumbled upon this website and after reading a dozen or so pages have decided to try my luck with PDLC’s, I was made redundant in 2011 and soon ended up having to use these! As with everyone else, it started with about £100 and soon escalated to £1000! Myself and my partner have had loans with just about every company! I’ll be happy with them just removing the defaults from our credit files so we can start a fresh.
Will keep you updated on how we get one
Lefin says
Well the first reply back in less than 24 hours from Lending Stream, offering to zero the outstanding balance. Have replied to them with step two requesting a refund of interest, I also added the removal of the default on my credit file.
Will keep updating as I go along but so far all looking promising!
Sophie says
HI Steve,
I asked the same question, however she couldn’t say yes or no at this time. I had a similar case with Wonga and they relooked at the information, it went in my favour. The FO is finding it a bit hard as they don’t class themselves as a payday lender (even though when you Google payday lenders lists they appear on there) its not as straight forward as the likes of QuickQuid/Wonga. Fingers crossed that with the info I have provided she is able to go in my favour. I should have a response back next week so I will let you know how I get on.
Steve says
Yes, good luck and please let me know.
Did you use the standard templates from here for your complaint or did you word a different way
Sophie says
I used the template from here, but amended it slightly. They sent me an email which was like an automated response, within 4 weeks I had a final response, them declining my complaint, but the wording as the exactly the same as the 1st email they had sent. From there went to the ombudsman. I have seen another post on there that SafetyNet had offered someone £400 as a gesture of good will, more than I got when I put my complaint in. They could possibly be started to worry now – although I doubt it.
There are a few other people on here with complaints in for SafetyNet, not sure how they are getting on at the moment.
Thank you, Im hoping they do uphold my complaint, I had paid over 900 in interest alone :(
redfraggle says
Good luck! I’ll be watching with interest as by far my biggest one in terms of interest and amounts borrowed is Safetynet. One could argue they should have known more than most given the access they have to your account. How they thought £1000 per month lending was affordable on a £1200 per month salary I will never know. They promised me a 48 hour response on Weds morning but I’ve not heard anything so have just chased them via email.
Sophie says
thank you Redfraggle,
I will update everyone as soon as I hear back from the FO. Yes I totally agree with you, the fact that they can see what is going in and out makes things even worse. This is a new one to the FO, as the adjudicator had never heard of them, so it could be a lengthy process. Fingers crossed it wont be!
Just make sure that you have a statement of account and all details as they will provide the FO with false, inaccurate or half the information as I have found today.
Joe says
My sentiments exactly , to my shame I got into this mess despite having my lending licence whilst working for one of the major banks and being a mortgage broker. Needless to say now I have had to take an alternative profession as they check credit files etc before job offers. Safetynet are like any other lender, the fact they deny this makes them worse. As I said on my complaint the fact they have access to my account means they ought to have been able to see other mainstream and payday creditors.
redfraggle says
Just had the following response from Safetynet Credit: I assume I now just request that they escalate?
Thank you for your recent contact.
We have taken some time to address the concerns raised in your email in order to provide an adequate response.
SafetyNet Credit prides itself in having best in class affordability assessments. Our technology, specifically the access to a read-only format of an applicant’s previous 90 days’ worth of current account bank transactions, means we are able to verify an applicant’s salary, as well as having sight of income and expenditure for the period, and any outstanding credit. Combined with the data we receive from the credit reference agencies, we are confident we are undertaking market leading affordability assessments.
However, we do of course understand that a persons’ financial situation can change, which is why we cap interest at 40 days and charge no late or default fees. This way, should your financial situation change after taking credit with us, there are necessary precautions in place to stop the debt escalating.
We have looked again at the decision we made when you first applied as well as your circumstances on an ongoing basis as a SafetyNet Credit customer, and we can see that we verified you, at the point of acquisition, through our read-only access, to have stable earnings of circa £1300.00 per month, as well as having an acceptable level of expenditure against income amongst our other checks. As already alluded to, we performed a credit search at the credit reference agency Callcredit and there was nothing to suggest we shouldn’t extend credit.
Having reviewed the account and our initial decision to lend we do not feel that a refund of interest is appropriate and as such the outstanding balance of £1276.00 will remain payable in its entirety.
If you think you may have trouble paying this balance, please give us a call on 0800 180 8405 and we will work together to create an affordable solution.
If you are unhappy with this proposal, you have the option to escalate the matter to a formal complaint.
When a formal complaint is made you can expect a response within 4 weeks of the date it is raised. In some cases this period can be extended to 8 weeks, for example if it takes a little longer than anticipated to gather all the required information. In such circumstances where an extension is necessary, you will be informed via e-mail.
Sophie says
I had exact same response, tell them you are going to the FO!
redfraggle says
Also just had the following from Lending Stream – [very long email]
Sara (Debt Camel) says
You borrowed took 2 loans for £95 and £200. how much have you repaid so far? what is the outstanding debt?
Redfraggle says
I’ve paid a total of £481.37 back already and the outstanding balance remaining including charges is £118.62
Sara (Debt Camel) says
OK, so across the two loans you have paid £186 in interest and charges so far (£481-£200 -£95). If you take it to the Ombudsman, you could potentially get back £186 plus 8% interest which might come to (very rough guess) £60 and the loans removed from your credit record. But with only two loans, it is possible the Ombudsman wouldn’t agree with the complaint… It’s not a generous offer from LS, but it’s not stupidly low. Difficult call for you.
Redfraggle says
Just realised that was only for the first loan. I paid an additional £184.10
So I paid 481 on loan 1 and 184.10 on loan two.
This reads to me that I could be looking at around 370 plus 8% interest (481+184-95-200) Nothing to lose by referring I guess as I had several other loans at the time.
S.D says
ombudsman have asked for bank statements for my claim, worried as I spread across 3 bank accounts so lenders couldn’t just take my pay as I didn’t trust them, not sure how I will gather the evidence, they’ve asked for almost 3 years worth, also it will show I was gambling heavy.
I hoped my really bad credit report that I provided would be enough but obviously not
Any advice
Billy says
My bank statements showed very heavy gambling, like every day and sometimes hundreds. Ombudsman didn’t flinch and upheld both complaints against Poundstopocket and QuickQuid. I got back £3200 in interest altogether.
Robert says
Hi Billy – how heavy are we talking? My statements show hundreds of gambling transactions over the period I’m looking to claim back. Often for quite a lot of money. What portion of your income were you repaying to pdl?
S.D says
Robert , billy thanks for commenting I know it’s a touchy subject.
I’m hoping I don’t need to submit the bank statements to win I sent ombudsman adjudicator the credit reports and a spread sheet and statements of all my other payday lending, those dark days of gambling and the bank accounts from those years are something I don’t want to revisit
Billy says
S.D –
The FO asked for about 3 months statements from me for a certain point in 2011 and I was using a certain online bookie sometimes 10-15 deposits in one day. Deposited about £20k during that 3 months (withdrew a fair bit too, but the deposits were a lot more than the withdrawals).
if anyone ever looked at those statements from 2011, Christ knows what they’d think. I was a gambling monster. Estimated I blew 50k that year. I wasn’t even earning that much (roughly half that amount). Trouble is, I can’t even remember doing that much gambling – it just absorbed every waking hour if you look at my statements. Scary.
Thankfully I got help and I’m trying to limit my gambling these days, it’s bloody hard though, I’m sure you’re aware of the struggles.
I think the main point I’m trying to get across is that the Ombudsman is impartial and non judgemental. They’re looking at the facts. Whether you chose to spend the money on gambling, booze or fast cars is irrelevant. The main point is the loans were granted irresponsibly while you were showing obvious signs of financial distress – this would have been evident from your credit file, your roll overs and your heavy reliance on expensive short term borrowing. The fact is, the payday lenders ignored all this to try and make a quick buck from you. I’m going to do another post about my successes, keep an eye out for it.
Billy says
I wasn’t going to share my experience but seeing so many success stories on here I feel like I should. I’ve been a compulsive gambler for about 20 years, all my adult life. I was heavily reliant on payday loans for about 5 years and was trapped in a cycle of borrowing and rolling over, like many others. Despite earning an above average salary, I was spending it all and more, every month.
I got an email back in 2014 from Wonga advising that they’d written off the £1000 that I owed them due to the fact that the FCA had put pressure on them to refund about 220,000 borrowers. This got me thinking that maybe the other loans were granted when they shouldn’t be. Starting off with Wonga, I went on a one man crusade, writing to all the payday loan companies asking them to refund interest and charges for the previous 5 years. I’ve had tremendous success, with refunds of £11,000 in total. I’ve still got a couple of lenders to go. I’ve listed my refunds below and indicated whether the refund was decided by the lender or the FO.
Refunds so far
£4800 Wonga (Lender offer)
£1800 QuickQuid (Onbudsman + default removed)
£1600 Payday UK (Lender offer)
£1700 Pounds2pocket (Ombudsman + default removed)
Myjar £600 (Ombudsman)
£550 others (Lender offers)
Good luck all. Persistence is the key. If there’s two pieces of advice is give, it’s that my mental health problems have helped the process – I told the lenders that I was depressed and on tablets and that the loans made these issues worse. The 2nd piece of advice is be honest with the ombudsman – yes, they’re impartial, but i felt they were on my side. They don’t like the practices of the payday lenders and know what sharks they are.
All the best
Billy
Barry says
Hi Billy,
I am a heavy gambler and a frequent payday loan user(now the first one is there to try and end the 2nd one, if you know what I mean), having read your story I feel like there may be light at the end of the tunnel. Quite frankly I have got myself into huge debt to these lenders and also now my family and I could not see an end to it. I have a lot coming my way in the next 12months (including a baby on the way) and quite frankly I did not think I would see my child born with the thoughts that were running through my head. Can I ask, did you use the same process/templates that are on here?
Thank You for this post, I hope to have the same success as you and get over my gambling habit.
Billy says
Hi Barry, I wish you all the best. I actually applied for my refunds using my own email which turns out is very similar to Debtcamels. I got refunds on the majority of the loans before I discovered Debtcamel.
Get yourself self excluded from the online bookies or at least limit your deposit allowance to a low amount, otherwise you’ll keep repeating the pattern and you’ll end up not having enough money for baby stuff, trust me. I’ve been there!
Robert says
Hi Billy,
Thanks for this. As strange as it sounds it is somewhat comforting to know that others have been in a similar position to me. It takes a terrible toll on your mental health and is no way to live your life. I’m glad you’ve had so much success getting some of the interest and charges back!
And Barry – I second what Billy has to say. I excluded myself from all sites bar two which I have strict deposit limits on. I haven’t completely stopped gambling but it is no where near the levels it was.
Hayley says
Hi,
Just a quick message to say thank you so much for such an honest post.
I woke up this morning much like most mornings doing a few sums on my phone calculator, praying somehow my outgoings came smaller, if not matched my due incomings. They, of course don’t and I stumbled upon this thread.
I have been an online compulsive gambler for about 4 years – started off small – always chasing the win, the bonus rounds etc etc, then when the wins started instead of thinking great – I’d kick myself for not staking bigger; and so my problems started.
I had £4000 in an isa that I dipped into, and have subsequently totally depleted and when that ran out I applied for credit cards.
Basically I have got into massive credit card debt and payday loans all to feed my habit.
I usually have ran out of money due to massive outgoings and repayments by about the 5th and so the payday loan cycle kicks in.
I feel totally ashamed of myself, and find myself lieing to family members about how much things are costing me etc to try to explain away my dwindling finances.
Anyway, I am going to sit down today to try to tackle this beast head on, I have already self excluded myself from the main culprits, but if I can recoup any money that I can put towards my debts that is a positive way forward.
Thank you again
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Hi Hayley, can I recommend two things. First that you contact StepChange (http://www.stepchange.org/Howwecanhelpyou/DMPdebtmanagementplan.aspx) and talk to them about a DMP. Getting your finances on an affordable basis has to be the first step in getting your life back. You can still go ahead with complaints to payday lenders, but if you have massive credit card debt that problem too has to be tackled.
Second that you look at software such as Gamblock. Think of it as the equivalent to a boost to your will power :)
Grouchy jester says
Can I add Gamblers Anonymous meetings to the list for anyone in this situation. I started attending 5 years ago from a pretty dire place and it has turned my life around. It won’t pay off your debts, but it will help you get control of your life so you can face your finance issues like a normal human being would. You don’t need to live your life as a gambler. Please attend a meeting or give them a call if you are in the position where you want to start changing your life.
Mark says
That so mirrors my life I’ve gambled most of my life and did all the usual things of moving money around borrowing left right and centre and lying about how much things have cost. By the end of this week I should only have a loan myself and girlfriend are paying left to clear so it’s a fresh start and if I get any money back it will be a bonus that my family can enjoy instead of all the gaming sites. Good luck.
S.D says
Hayley
Good luck with it all, I’ve been where you are and it’s only just over a year that I’ve managed to stop gambling but it’s been the best year if had in such a long time.
Payday loans are too easy too contribute to our problems,
Banks wouldn’t lend to us with accounts like ours or bank statements showing gambling issues. Banks wouldn’t even let us open normal current accounts.
Mortgage companies also wouldn’t lend, and the reason being is because they lend responsibly.
Payday lenders !! They hope you have a gambling problem so they can lend to the desperate.
Like drug dealers of the financial world.
So like I say Hayley , best of luck . Front it all and keep honest
Barry says
Seeing others posting does make me feel better I must say, I am sure we can all get this sorted out. I heard of a man local to me who committed suicide due to heavy debt which was due to gambling. I do not want these thoughts to ever come into my head again, I have a bright future ahead with a little girl on the way and a fantastic girlfriend that I want to share all my life with…also though I do not want to share this burden with her so I need to sort it out.
I have received the first response from Different Money yesterday (still waiting on 2 others). I have had 6 loans with them within the last 21months with interest totaling over £900. Does anyone have any experience with getting money back from Different Money? Any advice is greatly appreciated. The loans vary in amounts but I know I have taken out other loans to cover these and I had loans out with Pounds to Pocket and Wonga when applying for most of these loans with DM.
Thanks in advance for your help guys.
Vic Smith says
Hiya.
Just had a rapid response from cheque centres offering to refund all interest on my payday loans for the last 6 years equating to over £2k.
Started using them around 2009,so they wouldn’t budge on anything over 6 years,and no 8% interest added,but will accept the offer,as I am getting married in a few months,so that will come in handy.
I must thank Cheque centres for there excellent customer service,unlike some other companies on here.
Janet says
I have a further complication that a loan I could not pay in 2014 to Uncle Bucks has now been ‘assigned to’ 1st Stop Recoveries who have issued a court claim which I intend to defend in full. I still intend to submit a complaint to Uncle Bucks in line with the above article but has anyone else been in this situation?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Hi Janet, you need to reply to the court forms saying you will defend the case – National Debtline can give advice on how to do this, 0808 808 4000.
I suggest also asking for a copy of your CCA and a Statement of Account using national Debtline’s template letter.
Inform UB in your complaint that 1st Stop are taking court action. And inform 1st Stop that you are putting in a complaint to UB about the debt.
redfraggle says
Hi Janet,
Start your complaint and then email both Uncle Buck and 1st Stop recoveries – I did this and both Uncle Buck and 1st Stop have confirmed they have held all action on my account until the complaint has been concluded.
Victoria says
Hi,
I just wanted to say a massive thank you to Sara and Posters.
We got into a real struggle with our finances a few years back when hubby was made redundant. We used TXT(MyJar) to help us get through month to month and ended up borrowing more and more each time.
I sent my complaint letters just 2 weeks ago after finding this site and have received an offer of £2,311.91 for myself and £1,811.99 for hubby.
As you can imagine we are over the moon! We still have some debt to keep ploughing away at but this money will help us so much.
Good luck to all those still claiming :)
Donna says
Hi,
I had a response from QQ which is exactly the same as others have had recently (asking for bank statements, payslips, name of site for the template letter etc)
Having gone through all of the questions and answers on here in the last few days, I had originally decided to send them what they’re after, but on 2nd thought I realised it might help my case to mention the fact that they should have all that information on record for me already- having done the appropriate checks in the 1st place :)
Which response from me would be best?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
So you are hoping they might read your email saying “you should already have this information” and they are going to say “oh that’s a good point, never thought of that, better pay her the money”…. it’s not very likely to happen!
There are various reasons they may be asking for this information. They could be hoping to put off some people straight away, who won’t take their complaint any further. They could be hoping that more people will just gradually give up if the timescales get longer. They could hope that when they later reject your complaint, you will feel they had really looked at the issue so you will be depressed and not go to the Ombudsman. They could be looking for information they don’t have which will help them decide if you do have a case. Or a combination of all 4 of these…
But if you have the information to hand, or much or it, I suggest you send it. QQ so far don’t seem to ever payout without it going to the Ombudsman, but perhaps this new approach asking for information will change that?
Bex says
Hi All
I have had a response from Lending Stream writing off my balance but offering no compensation
” We believe in complete transparency and rely on the data provided by our customers while considering an application. The expenditure information provided in the application was assumptive of including any other financial obligations. Moreover, your credit score was inclusive of loan from other lenders when you applied with us and is considered sufficient for payday lending.
We understand that you might have had loans with other lenders, while your loan(s) with Lending Stream were approved; however, the checks were carried out in proportion to the amount you applied for and our analysis did not indicate that they were not affordable. ”
I only borrowed relatively small amount from Lending Stream and only on two occasions (I did have various other payday loans at the time). Is it worth fighting for compensation from them or just accepting the write off.
Currently I am waiting for Quick Quid to respond 9 loans in 16 months of which all were rolled over at least once – cant believe how much I borrowed / paid to them :-(
Cheers
Sara (Debt Camel) says
hi Bex, if you only had two loans, then unless you have paid a LOT of interest so far, writing off the second one is usually a reasonable offer.
hanahh says
I just thought I would post an update re my complaint against QQ as I seem to have had a different response to most people as in they have actually made me an offer. I paid over £2k in interest and charges. They refused me initially so I referred the case to the ombudsman last week who I must say we’re fantastic. Within 2 hours of my call they had contacted QQ, assigned my case to an adjudicator and emailed me with confirmation. The day after I got an email from QQ offering to write off £280 balance and pay me £150 for my distress as long as a waive my right to persuse it any further. I have refused as I think I have a good case (they haven’t asked me for any additional information before they made me this offer) I don’t know if it has made a difference that they said they conducted robust credit checks on me to search for ccj and insolvency etc. They obviously didn’t as I had been discharged from bankruptcy a few weeks before the first loan. They then lent me 1k plus interest and rolled over the loan or issued another one the same day it was paid off for 14 months. Anyway I have refused the offer and informed the FO and they have said they will carry on with my complaint. I will keep you updated as to how it goes but I was very surprised to get any offer from them at this stage before the FO has really got involved
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Hi Hannah,
I think this is QQ’s new tactic, originally they wouldn’t offer anything, now they offer a really small amount along with a lot of guff about their brilliant checking. Well their great checks missed bankruptcy in your case and in another case missed 3 CCJs …
Martin says
Hi Sara,
MyJar are now saying that they carried out a full credit check with CallCredit before issuing me with the loan but the details they received are not entirely the same as entries reflected on my personal credit report which I told them I had got from Noddle. I emailed them previously to say that I had seen my credit report from Noddle and it clearly shows that at the time they gave me a loan, I was in debt to other lending companies.
Is their information correct?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
We have seen various cases where a lender has said “we checked your credit file” but they don’t seem to have noticed what was quite obvious on it. One reader reported a lender missed the fact they were just discharged from bankruptcy, another lender apparently didn’t spot 3 CCJs …
redfraggle says
Quick Question – Uncle Buck passed my loan to 1st stop recoveries whilst I was out of the country which ultimately ended in me getting a CCJ. I have started teh ball rolling with an official complaint but am obviuously loathe to be paying 1st stop if it should be found in my favour. Do I need to be making these payments to 1st stop in the meantime??
Updated: Contacted Uncle Buck who have confirmed they have contacted 1st stop and all actions are on hold until the complaint has been resolved. Putting the amount I would be paying 1st stop into a side account now so if it falls down for whatever reason I still have the funds to clear it off ASAP. Will keep you updated.
Mel says
Hello,
I received an offer from Mr Lender for £287.50 when interest & charges were over £1200. I emailed them back on 25/02 saying that if they did not increase their offer substantially that I would have to go to the FO.
I asked them on the 28th Feb if this was their final offer and no response, do they have 8 weeks from my complaint email before I can go to the Ombudsman?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Hi Mel, I think you may as well go to the Ombudsman now. Worse case is they tell you you have to wait. Best case it gets going straight away.
Tim G says
Hi,
Encouraged by all the replies. I was, like others on here, a heavy gambler but with thanks to GA and some hard effort have been gamble free for over 2 years now.
I got into a lot of difficulty with payday loans including Lending Stream, EPDL, MyJar etc. In fact at one point I had over 12 loans all at once. I have just started the process of claiming and am receiving the bog standard rejection letters.
I’ll try and keep you all posted
redfraggle says
Following an email Pixie Loans received on the 3rd March 2016 in which you stated Pixie Loans has not completed appropriate affordability checks, therefore the loans provided were not affordable and you request a refund of the interest you have paid.
We have now investigated your complaint fully, and I am now able to provide you with an explanation and outcome of our decision.
Pixie Loans can confirm the following:
• 15/09/14 – An application for £100 in the name of R was received from Loan Machine (who are an online lead provider).
• 15/09/14 – You completed an affordability assessment and confirmed your income was £1200, your outgoings were £495, meaning your disposable income was £705.
• 30/09/14 – Pixie Loans debited the full payment of £120 by direct debit.
• 06/10/14 – An application for £150 in the name of R was received direct through the Pixie Loans website.
• 30/10/14 – Pixie Loans debited the full payment of £191 by direct debit.
• 01/11/14 – An application for £210 in the name of R was received direct through the Pixie Loans website.
• 03/12/14 – Pixie Loans attempted to debit the full amount of £284.30 by direct debit however the payment was returned unpaid.
After reviewing the evidence Pixie Loans can confirm that an affordability check was completed however not all the information was taken into consideration, therefore we cannot conclusively confirm that an appropriate affordability check was completed and we will uphold your complaint.
Pixie Loans offers to remove the interest you have paid on the loans obtained on the 15th September 2014 and 6th October 2014 and the remove the interest from the outstanding balance of the loan you obtained on the 1st November 2014 which you are still liable to repay.
This means a total amount of £67.61 which consists of the interest you have paid and the recommended interest calculation advised by the Financial Ombudsman Service, would be deducted from the original loan amount of £210 of your outstanding loan, which means your new balance would be £142.39.
If you accept our offer you will need to reply to this letter by email within 14 days of the date on this letter and we will adjust the balance accordingly. Please be aware if you do not reply to this letter the above adjustments will not be made.
You will need to contact our Customer Care team on 0333 004 0040 to arrange repayment of the outstanding balance.
If you are not satisfied with our response you can find details of how to contact the Financial Ombudsman Service below.
—————————————————-
I’m not sure if I need to be referring to the Ombudsman to have existing balances written off and credit file restored as it sounds like they have admitted partial liability? Any advice?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
I’ve shortened your post and removed your real name :)
You said previously you had half a dozen loans from Pixie – this reply only covers three – do you now think that’s right?
Redfraggle says
Thanks for the edit! I’m not sure as I thought I had one from them in 2015 also but can’t find the details for it and that bank account is now closed so I’m waiting on statements. If it does turn out to be the total of their lending to me (which it could be – I also had loans with pinkyloans and peachy at the time) what would your advice be?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
they are refunding all the interest and charges – you may well not get any more from going to the Ombudsman.
redfraggle says
Think you’re right – I am however thanks to another refund in a position to pay off the remaining balance. Do you think it’s worth asking for a reduction in the payable balance provided it’s cleared today in one lump sum?
Update: They have agreed I can pay a lower amount as a full and final settlement and they will stand by their refund of the fees etc. Happy to take that as I can clear the full settlement offer with money received from another claim which was found in my favour.
Thank you so much to all of you guys at debtcamel for all your help. I’m starting to feel like I’m getting somewhere. It’s slow progress but thanks to a combination of the lenders admitting to unaffordable lending, and all the stories from people like me on here, I don’t feel like such a complete idiot. It’s good to know it wasn’t me being an imbecile and that it was so easy to get caught in the downward spiral of borrowing from one lender to pay back another in ever increasing amounts.
grace says
Hi all things have slowed down since my last success, payday uk and payday express are on week 13 and all I keep getting is there generic email saying they have not completed their investigations these are both with the FO. Quick Quid with the FO. Uncle Buck asking for bank statements and credit report (sent today). Nothing from cash choice, or EPDL. I am in no hurry for the money but would like an update on the investigations. I will continue to email and call on a weekly basis and have emailed the FO today. Last week the FO ruled in my favour for Pounds to Pocket they have until the 15th March to make an offer so be patient keep going people x
Redfraggle says
I rejected offer as above from Lending stream… They came back with the following…
We would not refrain from providing you the required support at the time of your need. Thereby, should you prefer, we may recall the loan 206185 from the debt collection agency and close the loan with no further payments and waive the outstanding balance of £118.76.
Also, we offer to refund an amount of £303.60 (interest incurred post we were informed of the financial hardship).
Should you accept the offer, please provide us a confirmation so that we may make the necessary changes towards your loans and initiate the refund.
Although they do also state…
Please note that Lending Stream is required to report the loan status to credit reference agencies on a regular interval. We regret to inform that we are unable to remove the loans from your credit file as it was a genuine reporting and we are legally required to do so.
Should I be pushing for a correction on my credit file??
S.D says
Lending stream refused my first request to remove a default, they would only offer a reduced balance, I declined their offer and said I’d progress to ombudsman, a couple of days later they accepted and agreed to remove the default.
Stick with it
Redfraggle says
S.D
They must be in tune with your thinking… Just got the following from them
We write in reference to your recent correspondence.
We appreciate your willingness towards the acceptance of the offer. Please note that we offer to remove the default due to some procedural errors.
The loans that would be closed will reflect as “closed and settled” and the changes can be viewed in 30-45 days from the date of closure of the loans.
C says
Just had an offer from Lending Stream 10 days after my complaint offering to remove interest from both my loans that are now part of my DMP. No offer of any refund of interest from my first loan with them which I had repaid in full
Wondering if I should reply to their offer saying I would be happy to accept this if they were also to refund the interest on my first loan.
Any thoughts?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
HI C – if you only had 3 loans from them, then this is probably a reasonable offer.
ANN P says
Recently wrote to QQ, PaydayUK, and Wonga,
responses to date (only 1 week left of 8 weeks) progressed by email yesterday.
Wonga asking for more time, do you think I should await there final response as seen responses that can take between 10-12 weeks rather than go to FO.
Had a response from PaydayUK, saying couldn’t resolve within 4 four weeks and 8 weeks is up on 15th March.
QQ, initially sent me an email advising that no refund would be made within 24 hours of original complaint, however I emailed them back to advise that back in 2012 they wrote of £800 ( I had called to pay off the balance back in February 2012 (as had received some PPI compensation) to have been advised that the balance had been written off, also kept an email), I am asking for interest and charges for previous loans, 8 weeks is also up on the 15th March.
Any thoughts on Wonga, wait or Ombudsman?
Andrea says
Just had an email from MyJar. They’re denying there was any irresponsible lending as there was no requirement to make credit checks in 2012 (is this right?)
When I took the loans out I was in a bad place as I was off work long term sick. The second loan was taken out on the day I was told I had cancer. I was not in a good place mentally and was terrified that I would be left with nothing. On the third loan I took out I defaulted as I wasn’t on full pay. Yet they upped my loan limit when I finally paid it back. The next loan defaulted and despite me telling them I was in difficulty they keep adding interest. What do I say to this one please- can anyone help? Thank you!
Sara (Debt Camel) says
I suggest you take your complaint to the Ombudsman. Upping your credit limit when you had defaulted on the previous loan doesn’t sound very responsible to me!
Donna says
So this is the reply I’ve had from lending stream today:
‘We are writing in reference to your correspondence with Lending Stream dated 04th March ‘2016. Thank you for your patience while we have been working to provide you a complete and concise response.
Firstly, we would like to confirm that Lending Stream always ensure to run the proper affordability checks [edited to remove standard stuff]
We note that all your loans were closed on time as per the payment schedule. This created a strong repayment history in terms of your Lending Stream loans.
In view of the above, we confirm that Lending Stream performed necessary checks at the time of your loan applications. However, if you require any further assistance, please do not hesitate and get back to us for further clarifications on the below mentioned contact details.
If you have any further queries or concerns, please feel free to contact us on ….’
They’ve included Experian scores which decrease with every loan taken and I doubt I even had the scores they are saying as I had late payments, defaults and was even issued with a ccj! Also from looking at old bank statements I can see that they took numerous payments on one day for small amounts such as £5.00 rather than taking the full amount at once.
The above reply from them was in reply to my request for my statement of account. I haven’t yet sent an email with a complaint in it, however the above suggests to me that this is a part response to a complaint? Should I continue with a second email or just contact the FO?
Many thanks for any advice.
Redfraggle says
I got exactly the same and replied with the following…
I would like to reject your offer as listed below as I feel that the unaffordable lending criteria clealy applies to me. The fact that I took out two loans within a week of each other should have itself rang alarm bells. What’s more I reject your claim of experian credit scores as I do not believe at the time that this was an accurate representation of the state of my credit score at the time. I had several loans with other lenders and also reverted to a payment plan to repay some of the funds owed. The fact that I then defaulted on the payment plan should demonstrate clearly that the level of lending was unaffordable. I calculated that the total repayable for both loans including the interest would be circa £960 which is clearly unaffordable given my income at the time. The interest and fees payable on my loans I have estimated to be around £370.00
I would therefore ask you to reconsider my original complaint and request for redress including refund of fees and interest and also a correction on my credit file.
I would also appreciate a prompt response regarding this as intend to refer my case to the Financial Ombudsman where necessary and would like to get the ball rolling as soon as possible should this course of action be required.
I look forward to a prompt response.
Obviously use your own words but I went back to them and have just had the remaining balance written off, defaults removed and a refund of nearly all my interest and charges (303.60 – I calculated them to owe me 370is so was happy with that offer.
Worth a second email I reckon before referring to the FOS
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Hi Donna, I chopped out all the standard guff :)
I am afraid that doesn’t sound like a “final reply” so you do need to put in your complaint. Pointing out of course that should have noticed your Experian score was dropping but they didn’t. And also that you had a CCJ on dd/mm/yy and numerous defaults and late payments.
It may help if you actually get a copy of your Experian Statutory Credit report.
John says
Hi
My experience with the companies I have approached so far has been pretty good with no need for the ombudsman yet. My first email I sent to My Jar earlier this year and within a week they had responded with an offer to write off £600 owed, I had not paid this much interest with them across all loans so was happy enough with that and accepted their offer. I also complained to Wonga, who took the full 8 weeks but did send me a generic email at the halfway point saying the case was still being looked into. On the last day I received a offer of just over £2500, which I accepted and was in bank account within 3 days,
Lending stream have come back with a email saying they checked credit scores etc but not a final resolution, will email them again at some point as still not happy with response and if they are not helpful will escalate to the ombudsman. Have others to contact but personally I’m in no rush and happy to wait it out and give the companies to the option to give a fair resolution within the 8 weeks or a bit more, give or take.
Donna says
And this is the response I got from 247MoneyBox again in request to a copy of my statement of account:
Thanks for your email. Happy to provide information requested (though do be aware that all of this information was provided upon the advance of any loan as the loan agreement was sent to you via email – do check your junk or spam for this and also check any other email address’ you may have provided us with.)
We are aware that there are many forums and templated letters available on the internet to exploit any previous credit commitments under the wholly subjective banner of affordability. We have seen some legitimate claims upheld in the press such as with the lender Cash Genie. However, to compare our actions with their reported behaviour is inappropriate.
We are confident that the required assessments were carried out prior to the advance of all loans. We are able to substantiate fully the information on which lending decisions were based.
Our relationship was based on responsible lending in addition to responsible borrowing. We provided you with all the facts about our product and the charges and costs involved. We treated you as a rational individual able to make a credible decision as to whether to borrow or not. For our part of the relationship we acted on the information available to us at the time and the prevailing regulations and guidance at the time.
I note from your account with us that over the course of our relationship with you have still not repaid us the total amount that has been advanced to your account. Do be aware that, in our experience, it is likely that any third party mediators you may refer your account to may ask you to repay the difference in order that you have at least repaid the total amount that we have funded to your account.
We are, however, happy as a gesture of goodwill to resolve by writing off your balance.’
I believe the balance on the account is about £300, which I would be happy to have written off, however I have paid nearly £1300 in interest alone. Should I reply saying I want them to review their offer to include interest that I have paid or do I just refer to FO.
Thanks again for any advice.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
As they have made you an offer, I think it’s worth getting back to them before going to the FO.
Danny says
Hi guys a quick update.
Wonga upheld by FO refund of £903.76 went in my bank last Friday. Info gone off file already.
Wageday upheld by FO last Thursday £1438.64 into my bank about an hour ago.
Lending Stream disagreed with the FO adjudicator and now with an Ombudsman.
PDUK ongoing with FO, Quickquid same.
So happy I came across this site. I know I keep saying it but genuinely thank you.
For the people just starting out don’t give up!
Cheers, Danny
Ben says
This is the reply I had from myjar (txt loan). Not sure how to progress…any opinions would be appreciated.
Thank you for your e-mail, dated 2 March 2016.
In your complaint, you stated that we did not carry out sufficient affordability checks prior to issuing a loan to you.
You registered with us on 18 January 2013. At that time, lenders were required to run checks that were proportionate to the amount of credit provided. As such, we undertook a number of checks which included searching on public databases, fraud checks and our own credit scoring. Additionally, we used the information gathered from your application. In your application form, you stated that you were in full-time employment with Bae Systems, earning £1,500 per month. You also stated that you were single, had no dependants and were paying £400 per month towards housing costs.
You had 13 loans from us in total. Six of these were paid before the due date, one on due date and rest past the due date. Your last loan from us was requested on 6 November 2013, scheduled to be repaid on 24 November 2013 in the amount of £360. On the repayment date, we tried to collect the funds but the payment failed. We repeatedly tried to contact you via text messages and e-mail, but as we did not hear from you by 7 January 2014, the loan was handed over to a debt collection agency. As they were also unable to come to an agreement with you, a default notice was sent out to you on 18 August 2015 and the default was registered on your credit file on May 2015. The outstanding balance is presently at £550.
Having reviewed your account in detail, we agree that we could have done more to ensure that we are only providing you with affordable borrowing options, more so after you requested a new loan after repaying the previous one for the third time. To put things right, we are prepared to refund you the interest and charges on the loans that should have not been provided to you without further review into your financial circumstances (five loans), in the amount of £314.78. In addition, 8% of annual interest would be added to this sum, increasing the refundable amount to £384.86. As your last loan with us remains unpaid until this date, £300, the principal sum you borrowed, would be credited towards closing the open balance, which brings the total refundable amount to £84.86. Our proposal also includes the removal of any adverse entries from MYJAR to your credit report. We trust this response provides you with the information you require to make your decision and we trust that you agree that this is a fair way forward.
Please let us know as to whether you accept our proposed resolution. Should you agree, please provide your preferred banking details to us so that we could process the payment without delay.
Ben says
Can anyone advise whether I should accept this or take it further in hope of having the outstanding balance written off and full interest repaid rather than using the interest to pay off the outstanding loan amount????
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Using the refund to write off the outstanding balance is fine. But the offer to refund interest on only 5 loans doesn’t seem great.
It sounds as though you borrowed 13 times in a period of 10 months. That is a pattern that should have made Myjar realise you were in trouble, Of these you repaid 6 late and the last one not at all. I would be tempted to reply that you think you should be refunded for more than just 5 loans given how often you borrowed over such a short space of time.
Jamie n says
Quick update from Lending Stream. After they emailed to reduce my two loans I owed them, I contacted them by telephone on the 3rd March stating I felt my complaint had not be answered and they did not carry out proper checks. I have today received an email – not upholding complaint but writing off original loans and £1134.76 interest I owe and removing loans from credit report!!! I’m happy with this. So keep going guys it’s all worth it in the end. 8 complaints with the fo now
grace says
Hi all I am confused! I have just checked my Experian report as I do weekly! to find an open account appeared from Uncle Buck the same date I sent my complaint bit of a coincidence I have not agreed to this and the account was closed in 2012. Who do I need to contact to kick some arse x
James says
I had similar, they reopened my last loan and put late payments on my credit file. Currently in the hands of the adjudicator at the FO. She said she would deal with it as UB have so far failed to remove it even though they acknowledged the mistake.
Matt S says
Hi
Has anyone had any refunds from Vivus?
They have today offered to refund me all interest and charges plus statutory interest on 4 out of 5 loans that I had with them. They gave me a form to sign and date and to fill in with my bank details for bank transfer of money.
I did this this morning, scanned and sent back to them. Any idea how long they’ll take to do the transfer?
Thanks
Matt
Matt S says
To answer my own question, I asked Vivus about the timescale for receiving the payment and got the below reply :
“We confirm receipt of your acceptance and bank details.
The indicative timescales for payment is within the next 10 working days.”
Seems a little excessive to take up to 10 working days to process a bank transfer, especially considering the whole complaint process from first complaining to receiving their offer of redress only took 2 weeks.
Matt S says
And as a follow up to this, just checked my online banking and the money was there.
So 15 days in total from making complaint, to refund in my bank account of all interest on charges on 4 out of the 5 loans I had with Vivus (1st loan was interest free).
Fantastic response time from them considering that some of the ‘bigger’ named companies have taken as long as 4 weeks to even send a statement.
mark77 says
Hi all,
I had a total of 170 wonga loans raging from 20 to 800 pounds, all paid off on time. Also 71 qq loans for similar amounts, endless rollovers, applied on the same day as paid the loans off. My credit file showing over 150 records of pd loans,no late payments though. Is there a chance for me getting a refund? I paid over 12 thousand pounds on interest to wonga and qq?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Hi mark77, it doesn’t matter if your credit record was perfect, borrowing that frequently from a lender should have been seen as a sign you were in serious financial trouble. Definitely put in complaints to both Wonga and Quick Quid!
Sophie says
Hi Guys,
Just thought I would give an update……..
So since my last post regarding Safety Net and how to begin with the FO didnt uphold my complaint, but then explained it in more detail. They have now decided to uphold the complaint have recommended SafetyNet to refund interest charges from April 2014 to date +8% simple interest and £100 compensation for the distress. I have outstanding balance with them, the FO thinks they will wipe the balance with the refund giving and I will be left with a small amount. Im happy with this as the details will be removed from credit file and I wont owe them anymore money.
QuickQuid – today they got back to the FO saying they disagree with the FO’s recommendations as they had done proper checks etc, however they have suggested as a gesture of good will and they could have done more for my last loan which was a flex credit one they are happy to pay interest charges, so looking at about £1000. Again I have an outstanding balance with them, however they have not mentioned to the FO about this, so I have advised her I agree if they don’t mention the balance and reduce this to £0 then happy days. If they do mention the outstanding balance and take this off the refund giving again Im happy with this, as this will be the last one of my DMP and I wont be paying that this month :)
So after a very long process from November 2014 I have nearly finished.
Keep with guys :)
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Excellent – good to finish with two wins. And especially good that Safety Net are made to pay that £100 extra for all the difficulty they caused!
Steve says
Hi Sophie
That’s great news about SafetyNet.
Did you initially speak to them saying you were in trouble or did you go straight in with a complaint.
I currently owe them monies and it is due to come out at the end of the month and I will have to borrow straight away again, but didn’t know if they then put the account on hold whilst the complaint went through?
Since July last year my limit has gone up from £350 to £1000 with no salary increase, so not sure why they have done that.
sophie says
Hi Steve
I went straight in with a complaint. Back in 2015 I closed my current account down, and moved everything over, so they couldn’t get anymore money. Told them then I was having difficulty, never heard anymore from them, never even made payments towards it. To be fair I had other priority debts that
needed to be sorted first so they were the last thing on my mind. I then came across this website done all the others then thought right lets tackle this one so I did. Went straight in with a complaint, got letters sent I owe them money, just told they weren’t having any as there are is a complaint ongoing. Since then they have recorded my account as a default on my file, but as part of thew FO recommendations that will be removed. They state that they follow guidelines but the FO picked up that the fact they were taking money I was having to borrow straight away is causing harmful lending! They have till the 16th to agree/disagree but what the FO has suggested seems fair enough.
Thank you Sara it’s the help of this website that has done it! I think the 100 is a little extra as the amount owed against the amount of interest paid for is roughly the same. Good news all round though!
Adam says
Received £1,300 in my bank account from QuickQuid today.
(I went through the FO as QQ rejected my claim, saying they carried out checks etc etc. Email from ombudsman on March 2nd saying QQ would like to offer me £1,300 and the funds were in my account on March 7th!)
Now onto Wonga :-)
sophie says
That’s fab news Adam
I have a complaint in with them, today I received a call to say they reject the FO recommendations but as a gesture of good will and as they could have done more with my last loan they are offering me interest back on this, which is about 1000. I still have an outstanding balance so just waiting to hear back about what they are going to do either take it off the refund or reduce to 0.
I’m hoping I’ll hear back by tomorrow
Ggood luck with wonga. I too like lots of us had one with them and was successful, with the FO.
Adam says
I had an existing loan with QuickQuid on a repayment plan and they have agreed to wipe the balance as well as the refund of £1,300 so fingers crossed for you. I had around 30 loans with QQ and 50 with Wonga.
To be fair they were very quick to transfer the funds once I had accepted the offer.
dominika says
hello all small update from me :) received 1monthloan final response. First i asked them for statements of my account they didn’t respond anything then i went straight in to complain they didn’t even acknowledge my complain. so after sending this to FO they finally got back to me 7 weeks ago that they are looking into my complain. Today without any paperwork they offered me refund of £1050 i had 3 small loans with them but had many many rollovers on them so i am over the moon now :)
so far :
Wonga – £694
1month loan -£1050
Wagedayadvance – with FO
PaydayUK -with FO
Thank you Sara and Debt camel
Donna says
That’s brilliant news about 1 month loan. I sent them an email asking for statement of account on the 2nd and have heard nothing, I sent them the same email again yesterday but after reading your comment I don’t hold much hope of hearing back from them with the info so I may just get a complaint email typed up and start the ball rolling.
Craig says
Quick quid – I requested a statement of all loans I had with them and they replied within a day listing I had 6 loans with them between May 2010 – June 2012. Finding this quite a low number as during that period I was applying almost every month I managed to retrieve my login details for their website and was astounded to find that I had 23 loans with them and NOT 6 as they had advised! Not sure if this was a genuine mistake but if you still have access to your online account with these companies best checking! I had already submitted a complaint for the 6 loans but have since updated that to 23 loans. Let’s see what happens.
Also pursuing Wonga even though in 2014 I had it completely wiped due to the FCO investigation but still asking to have the interest refunded.
And payday express and lending stream on the list!
Mat says
Hi all,
I’ve been reading over the comments on this site and I’m considering putting in complaints to some of the payday companies I had loans with. My issue is, although at certain points the loans were clearly unaffordable (at one point I had 6 loans out whose repayments totalled more than my monthly income, and 6-month rollovers and 36 straight months making ever-increasing payments to Lending Stream!), a lot of my financial difficulties were exacerbated by a gambling problem. Would this influence any Ombudsman decisions against me if they request bank statements etc.? I think there is still a clear case that the loans themselves were unaffordable and that no credit checks were done (1 company offered me a bigger loan 5 months after I defaulted with them, I had multiple defaults and a CCJ on my report, along with many, many missed payments). I’m not even bothered about getting refunds as I’ve mostly sorted out my finances now, but I would really like to clean up my credit report, in particular a £940 default from Lending Stream for a £400 loan.
Any advice welcome :)
Sara (Debt Camel) says
We have had people here who have taken a complaint to the Ombudsman and won with gambling showing on the bank statements.
Billy says
Out of interest, how long did it take Lending Stream to default you? I owe them money and am going to try and set up a payment arrangent with them but could do without a default
Mat says
Hi Sara, thanks for your swift reply, much appreciated.
Billy, I had 2 loans out with Lending Stream, one started in August 2012, the second in October 2012 and both were defaulted on 1st December 2012, according to current credit report. They might be a bit better now given the current climate, but were totally uninterested in my payment plan proposals and refused to freeze interest and charges.
redfraggle says
Lending Stream update – Accepted their offer late on Tuesday evening after I got home from work. Refund money has just hit my account this morning! Not that I’ll actually see any of it as it’s just enough to pay the balance off on my credit card but I’m impressed with how quickly they sorted it. Can also close the credit card account now I can clear the balance! Yippee!
Frazer says
Hi, I have sent QQ a email in to having all my interest on my loans to be refunded plus 8%, this was done 6 weeks ago and today I recived a email saying they will write off all balances (I don’t have a balance or any loan outstanding) and offered me £450. I had 22 loans ranging from £500-£1300 over a period of 4 years, so interest would be avg £200 per month (on loans of £1300) Would you advise to take this to the FO or to email back to QQ asking how there finding came? And that the refund offer is unacceptable?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Thats sounds like a low offer. Also just a cut & paste rather than a detailed consideration of your situation. I suggest replying saying that they need to look again as you don’t have an outstanding balance and that you have paid a lot more interest than that. Have you calculated the interest and charges paid? it’s the total amount you have paid to them less the amount you borrowed.
Sam says
Just a quick update, heard from the FO today regarding my Wonga complaint.
They found that my fourth loan with Wonga shouldn’t have been provided due to difficulties shown paying me third.
They have advised Wonga to clear my credit file of the fourth loan and to pay any charges including interest back to me.
Wonga have until 17th to respond!
Donna says
This is the response (in snippets) I received from My Jar today:
‘…We have provided seven loans to you over the course of one year. Four of these loans were repaid late and the last loan remains outstanding until this date. Your last loan with us was requested on 24 March 2013 for £400 and this was scheduled to be repaid on 8 April 2013 for £468. Unfortunately, this payment was not made…..the loan was handed over to a debt collection agency on 27 May 2013. The outstanding balance is presently at £721.99 and it will not accumulate any additional charges.
We believe that your first loans with us were provided appropriately, as the affordability checks we undertook before providing you with the option to borrow determined that repaying this balance would not provide difficulty to you. While the time gaps between the repayment of one loan and requesting a new advance do not necessarily suggest dependency on short-term credit, I agree that these late repayments should have raised our concerns and we could have conducted a more in depth review into your financial circumstances before providing you with the last two loans.
Taking into consideration the frequency at which the loans were taken out and the previous late repayments, it is my belief that we should not have provided the last two loans to you. To put things right, we are proposing to close the currently outstanding loan without seeking any further repayments from you. In addition, we would be removing the entry relating to your outstanding balance with MYJAR completely from your credit report. I hope you agree that this is a fair way forward.’
Would you say this is a fair offer considering over the 7 loans I only paid a total of £551.14 in interest and charges?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
It looks reasonable to me :)
Lily says
Hi all, 8 weeks to the day of my complaint being registered with wage day advance I’ve received their offer.
Of 14 loans I had with them over 4 years, they are offering redress on loans 8 to 12. I disagree with their decision but wondered if someone can shed some light on the validity of the following statement they made:
“WDA used our own bespoke credit scoring logic, and during this scoring assessment we used comparable information to determine the accuracy of the information you provided. At no point during the application process were we concerned that the information you provided was inaccurate. WDA did not use Credit Reference Agency (“CRA”) data and the assessment of affordability was completed based on self-declared information provided by the customer. There was no specific legislation that stated on-line lenders must use CRA data in the process of underwriting an application. Our decision lending criteria process was determined by combining the integrity of the data provided by the customer along with our bespoke credit scoring metrics.
Whilst we understand now from the information you have provided that you had outstanding debts; we could not have been resonably aware of these issues without you informing us of them prior to applying for the loans”
At the time of all of these loans I had active, unsatisfied, ccjs and various defaults on other debts without the numerous other payday loans recorded on my credit file.
Still I’m seeing this as a positive result…..it’s a step in the right direction.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Well ignoring the stuff about their wonderful bespoke process that doesn’t seem to have worked well in practice the question is how good is the offer… how much is it and are they offering to remove defaults from your credit file? Are you happy with it Lily?
Lily says
Update: Having rejected the initial offer I received from WDA a week ago today, they have just agreed to include an additional 2 loans resulting in the offer increasing from £920 to £1,720!! I’m more than happy with this outcome and can’t thank Sara enough for her help in this process!! That’s 2 down, 3 to go!!
redfraggle says
Got the following from MYJAR – They’ve not listed it as a full and final response so not sure whether to accept or if I should go back to them and ask them to write off the o/s balance and refund me the full amount. Would be grateful for some advice/feedback
MYJAR
[edited] You had nine loans from us in total. Seven of these were paid on the due date, one past the due date and your last loan is still outstanding. On 19 April 2012, you contacted us asking to defer your loan repayment and accepted that this may incur additional fees. As per your request, we set up a repayment plan for you. You contacted us again on 3 July 2012 to advise us of your complicated financial situation. We then froze the balance of your loan and set up an affordable repayment plan for you as per your request. However, we never received any payments from you towards this loan and the loan remains outstanding to this date. We repeatedly tried to contact you via text messages and e-mail, but as we did not receive any payments from you by 14 August 2012, your account was handed over to a debt collection agency. As they were also unable to come to an agreement with you, the loan has now been returned to us. As we did not receive any payments from you, a default notice was sent out to you on 23 July 2015 and the default was registered on your credit file on September 2015. The outstanding balance is presently at £554.
Having reviewed your account in detail, we agree that we could have done more to ensure that we are only providing you with affordable borrowing options, more so after you requested a new loan after repaying the previous one for the third time. To put things right, we are prepared to refund you the interest and charges on six loans that should have not been provided to you without further review into your financial circumstances, in the amount of £310.60. In addition, 8% of annual interest would be added to this sum, increasing the refundable amount to £407.93. As your last loan with us remains unpaid until this date, £300, the principal sum you borrowed, would be credited towards closing the open balance, which brings the total refundable amount to £107.93. Our proposal also includes the removal of any adverse entries from MYJAR to your credit report. We trust this response provides you with the information you require to make your decision and we trust that you agree that this is a fair way forward.
Please let us know as to whether you accept our proposed resolution. Should you agree, please provide your preferred banking details to us so that we could process the payment without delay.
[standard stuff on the FOS]
Sara (Debt Camel) says
I think that looks like a reasonable offer.
Shaun says
Hi redfraggle.
Very similar to one i received from them yesterday, (although they added ‘final response’). I had 30 loans from 2010-2013 so very few months without re-financing. They had the cheek to offer me a derisory reduction on an outstanding loan (my outstanding loan is only £556. Myjar offered to reduce to £420) and that’s it.
I sent them my final response today giving them until next Tuesday to come back with an improved offer taking into account affordability, interest and charges paid back etc, then it’s over to the FO on Wednesday. I really don’t understand their logic in my case? I’m confident the FO will uphold and MYJAR could possibly be a lot more out of pocket than if they’d just dealt with me.
SK says
Hi, I myself have been living off payday loans every month for maybe the last two years, i pay a loan in full on pay day then borrow on the same day. should i try and get the refund?
i am currently still in debt with them, my months wage would be used to pay them back. ive had multiple loans with 7 or 8 companies, some still outstanding. The amounts i borrow get bigger each time. ive had alot of rollovers and payment plans does this matter?
thank you
SK x
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Hi SK,
Yes I think you should try ask for refunds. But you also need to end your dependency on borrowing each month… when you are in a hole you have to stop digging! The bast way to do this is to contact StepChange http://www.stepchange.org/ and ask to set up a debt management plan, where you make one affordable payment to StepChange every month and they divide this between your creditors. (They will also look at whether there are any better ways for you to end this debt spiral, but a DMP is the most common approach.)
Going to StepChange won’t mean you can’t ask for refunds. It can even help in a way as it proves that you can’t afford the loans that you currently have. So I suggest going to StepChange first and then after that is set up. starting to put in the complaints to the lenders – start with the lender that you have used the most often. Good Luck!
Sophie says
Hi Guys,
Another success…..
QuickQuid have finally come back and are going to be paying my interest, the amount of £1500. I still owed them £500 and this will be taking off the amount that they are paying me. You maybe thinking that the whole thing should be paid to me, to be honest with you im happy with £1000, they are now off my DMP, and as of next month I save my self a little extra as I wont be paying that anymore.
For those people interested in how I got the offer: The FO originally contacted QQ on the 23rd Feb with her recommendations and she gave them till the 8th March. The FO received a response that they didn’t agree with what they said and put forward a different offer after a few days of going back and forth they finally settled today and money should be with me within 24 hours.
I have one more to go, which is SafetyNet, they have responded to the FO to say they need more time to look at the recommendations that were sent by them. With this one I don’t expect a lot back as I have an outstanding balance with them Im pretty hopeful that they are going to agree with the recommendations.
One happy little person :)
Matty says
Afternoon,
Been a while since I posted. In week 7.
Elevate on behalf of a couple of companies rejected my sunny complaint. I replied advising it was regarding 1month loan too and they replied within the hour advising full refund of interest for 1monthloan but Sunny response still stands.
Final response from quick quid. Offered £150 with an awful templated reply. I’ve obv rejected it and off to FOS it goes.
Anyone know how long it takes Elevate to sort these refunds?
Cheers
grace says
I received a call from the FO and email yesterday regarding Quick Quid I sent my original complaint on the 27th November and the FO have agreed with me asking them to pay and that they have had more than enough time to reply, I am now receiving emails saying they never received my original complaint pahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh I kindly sent them a copy! Pounds to Pocket have until Sunday to reply to the FO with an offer. I am still waiting on Payday UK, Payday Express, Opus, Uncle Buck, Cash Choice and are going into week 15!!! Hoping to hear something good soon x
mj says
First success, wonga have made me an offer through the ombudsman that I’m happy to accept. Got 2 big ones still to conclude and a small 1 with sunny that I’m not optimistic about it
Carol says
Hi Guys wee update. I wrote to cheque centre in December and received a final response letter within 3weeks, stating they felt all my 45 loans were affordable and assumed my partner helped pay for loans.
F.O upheld my complaint against cheque centre on March 5 and Cheque centre have now agreed to my refund of £5800. So glad I found this site thanks everyone.
laura says
Sunny have written off £670 debt owing
Satsuma have rejected my claim – just send complaint to FOS
Still waiting to hear back from Wonga – 8 weeks is up 26th march
Sarah says
I just wanted to say thank you for all the help and information on this site. Like lots of others I went through a difficult period after the breakdown of my marriage and had a period of robbing Peter to pay Paul, blinding borrowing from PDL firms and getting caught in the spiral. Thankfully now I am in a much better position but my credit record is shot to pieces. Thanks to your site I have finally been able to write to these companies and am hopeful of some recourse. In less than 2 year I borrowed from Wonga 39 times and had my loan amount increased sometimes 4/5 times per month, despite having defaults on my credit file and not being able to pay them initially for 4 of the loans they gave me! I paid them all back but I am hoping I have a case for getting some of this money back – it was over £15k including interest & charges.
QuickQuid I have only borrowed from once but I defaulted on the amount, having 5 loans with Wonga at the time and 3 defaults showing on my credit file, I just want them to write off the debt and remove it from my credit file, fingers crossed.
I’m after some advise about Lending Stream – I had 2 loans with them totaling about £1000, this was at the same time as the above but like Wonga they were paid back and cleared. They are showing on my credit file as loans and not “pay day loans and show as settled. I am not worried about claiming back interest from them but have been told pay day loans on my credit file will affect my ability to get a mortgage even when any defaults have come off. Do you think I should go down the same route with Lending Stream to request they take the loan off my file or leave it as it isn’t showing as a PDL? Any advise welcome!
Thanks again
jamie says
SUCSESS LENDING STREAM,
I have just accepted a settlement from lending stream, they have cleared the balances of 6 outstanding loans ( £650) and given me a refund of £355, in total I had paid £850, in interest, but feel that the fact I am clear of depts from them and a refund of £355, is acceptable, they have been very nice to deal with to be fair to them, in total I probably could of argued for another £500 but felt happy with what I accepted, I started on the 19th of feb, so the time scale has been good as well, so, so far £163 from pday express, £260, piggy bank, and now £355, + balance clearing from Lending stream, im still waiting for P2P, Wonga, Quick Quid, and Sunny, although these ones together amount to over £7000, so im expecting to have to go to the FO with them, but fingers crossed with a settlement first.
many many many thanks for Sara and this site :)
Jason says
Hi All,
Please advise below is the reply i got from 247Moneybox, This offer was made before i even made the formal complaint, this was sent upon the request for statement information.
Are they offering to write of full balance or just the interest on the current one?
I currently owe £515 for a loan of £430 but have had numerous loans over the years with them, so i cant work out if they are offering to settle the loan for £430 or asking me to now pay £430? Advice would be helpful.
Hi Jason,
[edited]
I note from your account with us that over the course of our relationship with you have still not repaid us the total amount that has been advanced to your account. Do be aware that, in our experience, it is likely that any third party mediators you may refer your account to may ask you to repay the difference in order that you have at least repaid the total amount that we have funded to your account.
We are, however, happy as a gesture of goodwill to resolve by settling your balance for a payment of £430.
I am your personal account manager and would be happy to discuss any of the above with you over the phone. I am available on 0207 183 8078 between 08:30 and 18:00 Monday to Friday. If you would prefer, please do feel free to provide a number and time at which I can reach you directly.
Kind regards,
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Hi Jason, almost all of that is their standard letter, so I will edit it out. It would be nice if some of these lenders could actually write simple English, wouldn’t it!
They are offering to settle your outstanding balance of £515 for a payment of £430, but I think that is just for the last loan.
I suggest you repeat your request for the full list of loans you took out..
Kez says
Hi All,
I just found this thread last night and it has been very useful.
I sent emails out today asking for statement of accounts and so far have received 2 responses:
Uncle Buck has asked for £10 for the SAR request – I responded with the template found on the site.
Mr Lender replied with a statement of account but it says:
Checks
Affordability checks – Yes
CRA – Yes
The loan amount was £300 and I paid back £547 – In the month of this loan and the month prior to taking it out I had apx 6 payday loans outstanding. Is it worth pursuing this? My credit report would have defiantly shown missed payments etc. I was at a very bad point financially with payday loans seeming like the only way out. I had got to the point where I was using them to pay each other.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Well it’s not much effort to take this further – it’s just an hour or so of your time to write the complaint email. The fact the lender says they conducted affordability checks – well they would say that, wouldn’t they! The question is whether their affordability checks were satisfactory.
Kez says
CFO have replied but they have supplied a written breakdown instead of an actual statement:
The business first received successful application for credit from you on the 19th August 2011. Prior to completing your application for credit the CFO Lending website made it clear that this was a no credit check short term loan. At the times of your application CFO Lending were regulated by the Office of Fair Trading (OFT) and were no required to complete a credit check.
On receipt of your completed application for credit your application was passed to our underwriting team. Our underwriting team completed a Bank Wizard and Experian verification check to ensure the name, address and bank details matched those on application following this based on the information submitted by you our underwriting team was satisfied you had enough disposable income to meet the required repayment and your application for credit was approved.
The business received a second application for credit from you on the 9th September 2011 for the additional amount of £120.00. again on receipt of your application your application was passed to our underwriting team for further assessment. Following relevant checks made by our underwriters our underwriters had no evidence of any pending changes in your financial circumstance that would affect your ability to make the required repayment and your refinance application was approved.
Your account fell into default on the 27th June 2012 when the business failed to receive payment as agreed. Due to your account being in default collections procedures were in place in an attempt to collect full amount of funds owed under the agreement.
To date we have received payments totalling £1205.21 leaving a current outstanding balance of £9.33. as per your Direct Debit arrangement plan payment of this amount is due to be collected on the 31st March 2016. On receipt of this payment your account with the business will be settled in full and closed.
I think I should write back asking for an actual statement as they have not put the amount of the initial loan. Or, is it possible to just go ahead with my complaint?
Thanks for the help
Kez
Kez says
Hi Sara, so CFO have provided a statement:
As previously advised at the time of your applications CFO Lending were regulated by the Office of Fair Trading (OFT) and were not required to complete a credit check.
On receipt of your applications for credit our underwriting team completed a Bank Wizard and Experian Verification check. Based on the income and expenditure information provided our underwriters were satisfied you could meet the required repayment and your applications were approved.
I initially borrowed £250 which i deferred once and then repaid. I took another loan for £450 and deferred 6 times. i incurred 9 late interest fees ranging from £25 – £182 taking my balance up to £1214. I had a couple of returned payments and since then have been paying the balance off with only £9 to pay. I would have copied the statement and posted it for you to see but the format wont paste correctly on here.
Kez
Sara (Debt Camel) says
OK, so your interest + charges come to 1214 – 450 = £564 on the second loan + the interest from the first one. The lender may not have been obliged to complete a credit check, but the deferral on the first loan was an early warning sign you may have been having problems which they should certainly have realised with the second loan early on. That looks like the basis for a good complaint to me.
Kez says
Hi sara,
I have had a few statements of accounts now and have been working on sending out my complaint letters.
I received a SoA from paydayuk and paydayexpress. The payday express statement only went back to 2011 which i found a bit surprising as they were debiting my account from 2010. I checked the loans i had prior to this and the debits it corresponded with loans from Express Finance – I called them up to clarify and they advised that they were one in the same company and those loans must have been archived. The lady i spoke to was very polite and advised if i was due a refund they would have contacted me already. She then offered for someone in there specialist team to call me back tomorrow to go over it all. I agreed to the call but figure they may try to dissuade me from pursuing a complaint!
Also, do you know what is likely to happen if the debt was passed on to a collections agency? This is the case with a few of mine – happy to look on another link if you’ve already covered the information.
Would you have any details on who the company CASHEURONET UK would be? i cant see them on your list.
Regards,
Kez
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Debts with a collections agency – complain to the original lender, not the debt collector.
Casheuronet are best known as QuickQuid and Pounds to Pocket – all their brand names are listed here: https://register.fca.org.uk/shpo_searchresultspage?search=casheuronet
Kez says
Hi Sara,
Uncle Buck asked me for £10 for a SAR so I sent them the template letter regarding them not providing me with the information needed to make a complaint. I still didn’t hear anything after a week – not even an acknowledgement so last night i sent them a follow up email re-iterating the action i would take if the SoA wasn’t received. This morning UB sent a SoA which detailed a £400 loan taken out in Nov 2008.
The statement showed they have provided shows that I made rollover payments of £120 for the loan every month from 2008 until 2012. It then shows I paid off £450 in Feb 2012 and then the loan was written off.
They seem to have missed to loans I had with them July and August 2011. I have checked my emails i have one from Motormile finance collecting an outstanding sum for UB as recently as last year.
I think it would be best for me to go back to UB and ask for all the SoA and then make my complaint, I dread to see my payments were for these.
Regards,
Kez
Matt S says
Hi
Received the below from Lending Stream.
“”We are writing in reference to the recent correspondences you had with Lending Stream, regarding the affordability checks conducted while approving your loans.
Please note, we understand that you might have had loans with other lenders while your Lending Stream loans were approved, however, your loans were approved in proportion to the amount you applied for.
Further, we believe in complete transparency and rely on the data provided by our customers while considering an application. Before approving a loan, our underwriting system checks the expenditure information provided in the application, which was assumptive of including any other financial obligations. Moreover, your credit score was inclusive of loans from other lenders when you applied with us and is considered sufficient for payday lending.
In view of above, we confirm that affordability checks were performed with due consideration while approving you for loans. However, considering your circumstances and financial difficulties that still persists, we offer to waive all the interest and charges incurred on loan 1564336 and close the loan after the receipt of original borrowed amount.
To clarify, you borrowed the loan for £320.00 and have repaid £185.88. After the successful receipt of the remaining principle balance of £134.12, the loan would be closed successfully. Also, you may clear this reduced outstanding balance in an arrangement as per your ease.””
Now I only had 2 loans with Lending Stream, the first of which was paid off. The second loan was taken out stupidly by me when I was in a desperate place and only 7 days before I had to enter into a debt management plan with outstanding payday loan debts from 12 different lenders totalling over £4000 (on a salary of around £2000 a month). They previously advised me that my credit score at the time of taking out this second loan was 763 and this took into account other loans I had outstanding with other lenders.
I currently have 3 defaults on my credit report (one of which is Lending Stream) which I would really like to get removed. Is it worth me pushing them to try and get my outstanding balance written off and the default removed? Or should I accept their offer?
Thanks
Matt
Vic Smith says
Hiya Matt.
I had a similar letter from Lending Stream,to just pay the balance and they would wipe out all the interest.
I accepted this,and used my Wonga payout to clear the balance.
I could have held out for a little bit more,bit I thought it was a fair offer.
It is your decision,but I would accept.
Vic
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Do you think your credit score was anything like 763? It’s worth asking because some people have reported being quoted credit scores which were much too high. Also how much interest did you pay on the first loan? How much are they offering to write off and what would be the remaining balance?
Matt S says
Hi
My credit score was down in the low 500’s at the time, so nowhere near the 763 that they claimed. They have come back today and offered to write off the outstanding balance which I will be happy to accept. However they also told me that they had not posted a default to my credit report, but when I look it shows a default dated 16/12/13. I’ve gone back and informed them and told them that I also want this removed as if they’d not given me this unaffordable loan in the first place then I wouldn’t have defaulted on it.
Matt
Debs says
Thankyou so much for all the help on this site
In the last 2 weeks I’ve already had £500 refunded from my jar!!
My problems now are lending stream, payday express and payday UK.
Lending stream have emailed offering to reduce the remaining balance but no refund..I had 5 loans at one time with them (ashamed). Do I pay the reduced payment and move on? Or do I push for refund or the debt wiped off?
Any advice would be appreciated
ken says
It all depends on what financial state you were in while had these loans. They offered to clear my balance of £330, but no interest refund, but seeing as i had over 20 loans with them i thought best to take it to financial Ombudsman. It went in my favour due to way they loaned to me even after i defaulted a loan then continued to loan to me after. They then offered refund on only a few loans, which i rejected,so now just waiting for Ombudsman to make final decision. Now taken over 18 weeks from start of complaint so its up to you if your willing to wait that long and it may not go in your favour, but the only thing you will lose is time as they have already made you an offer. So you will at least get what they have already offered you. Good luck. And Lendingstream do drag it out as long as possible never keep to time scale, always a week after they would say it would be, its added at least 4 weeks to complaint with them dragging it out.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Hi Debs, do you know how much interest you paid? And how much they offering to reduce the outstanding balance by?
deborah h says
Hi Sara
The statement lending Stream have sent doesn’t say how much interest was added to each loan, just the date, amount and whether it’s closed. At one point I had 5 loans running at the same time with them! And 15 loans in 18 months.
I’ve also just received an email from payday express with this at the end
‘further to your comment concerning the credit check details completed, there is no legal obligation to supply you with this information’
I thought they were supposed to be transparent??
Debs
Sara (Debt Camel) says
It is amazing how many ways the lenders can find to be unhelpful. I would just go ahead with a complaint to LS – that number of loans suggests financial distress to me.
PD Express. Yawn. Just ignore this and send them a complaint.
deborah h says
Hi Sara
Fast response from LS
Sent complaint email to LS last night had a response today offering to clear the balance with the interest they are willing to pay me back.
Is this usual?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
It is unusually fast, but they will have expected you to make a complaint and 15 loans in 18 months is a pretty clear cut case! The cases where there is a significant balance outstanding are in many ways the easiest ones to get an offer on as it costs them very little to write off these often old debts.
A good result for you, I hope!
deborah h says
After re-reading the long winded email LS sent with amount they’ll refund and payoff the defaults with I’ll actually receive £10.77. After reading through comments on here about them I think I’ll take the tenner and run at least I can sleep at night then knowing I don’t owe them a penny.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Not sure how reasonable that offer is… but it’s your decision, it would be nice to get rid of the debts!
Wayne says
Hello received a disappointing Email from the FOS today my complaint against Lending Stream not upheld.
They state Lending Stream acted acordingly when approving my application. At the time I had 6 months prior payday loan lending with other lenders and over a £1000 a month going out on financial comments. . The FOS said I only had one loan with them and was over 6 months so payments were more affordable, my credit score was 710, and on my application I had a disposable income of £800..
Very disappointed :(
Sara (Debt Camel) says
It is harder to get complaints about installment loans upheld as the monthly payments are lower. Do you think the FO decision is reasonable?
Wayne says
Hello I have disagreed with the FOS , and asked them to investigate further. I believe I have a good complaint . My credit report shows evidence of payday loan lending prior to taking out a loan with Lending Stream, in fact I was borrowing every month for 6 months before and increasing in size .My bank account show I was out of money a few days after wages going in . The FOS didn’t ask to see credit report or bankstatements!!!
Sara (Debt Camel) says
OK in that case you need to send them your bank statements and credit report!
Wayne says
Hello Yes I have Emailed them back asking for further investigation, I was surprised because I thought my complaint looked good on paper. I have 3 other complaints with them and 2 more just waiting for 8 weeks or a final response. Wonga have asked for 4 extra weeks which I have agreed too. To date I have £1600 refunded from My Jar and entries removed from credit report , so one positive result. I will keep you updated.
mark77 says
Hi,
two weeks after complaining to Lending Stream they offered to write off my six loans totaling 1495 pounds.
Very happy with that.
Thank you.
Chris Taylor says
I have just had a letter from money shop, refund of 386.62 for interest and charges. Still waiting on qq and Mr lender as they are both under review with ombudsman
Jayo says
Hi all
I have been trapped in a payday loan spiral now since 2011 I have had loans with most of the mainstream leaders.
I don’t know how I let myself get into such mess and I am really ashamed that I did. Basically I started off borrowing just a couple of hundred to get me by but this soon turned into borrowing more money a month than I actually earn.
I have changed my life total in the last 12 months as my girlfriend found out and luckily supported me and helped me out of this mess. We had to move out of our house and live with parents for the past 14 months but I have paid off all my pd debts which was aproximatly 5k worth.
From about 2013 I started to become a heavy gambler, i was always trying to chase a win to pay off my debpt. I am very ashamed of this but like I said my girlfriend has been my rock she could of easily turned her back on me but realised I had a problem and helped me kick my habit. I have totally screwed up the last few years and have missed my little girl growing up as I have been working every hour I could to try and keep us financially afloat.
Out of the blue last month I received a letter from pduk stating that they had borrowed me money when they should of and would pay me back interest on 2 loans +8%. Which came to around £190
I was shocked and couldnt believe it, I thought it was a scam at first but after doing a bit of research I found that the had been told to pay back money to people that shouldn’t of had money lent to them in the first place. After a quick search on the net I stumbled on this thread.
I only used pduk a few times so I was shocked by this, I used wonga and qq every month since 2011 and in the end I defaulted on there payments as they had become massive.
I have sent a complaint to all payday lenders and had rejection letters from Mr Lender and peechy. QQ wonga and pounds to pocket are still ongoing.
I’m not worried so much about getting any money back it would be nice to know that they are strictly regulated now and monitored so that it’s harder for people to get in such as mess like I did. I honestly thought that I was the only 1 out there in this mess. Wish you all the best with all your cases.
Sam. F says
That’s exactly how I found out about this too, PayDay UK just put some money in my bank & then wrote to me, I had no idea. Good luck with your claims :)
Jayo says
Yes they sent me a letter then 2 days later the money was in my bank. I only had a couple of loans with them so was suprised. My main 2 are wonga and qq I have paid over around 4k in interest to each of these, I have had a loan with them every month since 2011 to early 2015.
Claire a says
Hi all,
So Qq, lending stream have both gone to fos after lending stream offering to wipe two of my small loans and reducing the others so Iv gone to fos. Qq have said the usual after 8 weeks of waiting, that they did their checks Ect!
Waiting on wonga now week 7…do many people get their interest back with out going to fos? I just want this all sorted now! This is my biggest one and they wrote off my last loan in October 2014. So I’m sure I have a good case with them. Ang info you have had with wonga would be great please?
Provident have been a pain! They wouldn’t accept my complaint as it was sold on to Lowell who looked into it for me and declined so taken provident to fos and they now have 8 weeks to look in to my complaint that they originally wouldn’t accept! How can they get away with this!