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?
Sarah says
Hi there! I have just started the process with the help of this website. My husnand and I took out many loans of this type between 2010 and 2013. Is this too long ago to get a refund? Also, the bank accountss I was had at the time are now closed. Quick Quid are asking for bank statements. I do not have these and really can t afford to pay for them. What is the best response in this case to their requests. I have used your templates etc plus personal information about circumstances. Thanks so much in advance.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Loans that are over 6 years old will have to go to the Ombudsman as QQ will reject any refund there. You don’t have to send QQ bank statements – just tell them to consider your complaint as it stands.
If it does go to the FOS, it is normally easy to get old bank statements and the bank usually won’t charge a daft amount per statement if you tell them why you need them.
Shirley temple says
Just waiting to hear back this week from payday express as the fo has ruled in my favour what’s people’s experience with them are they usually helpful and fast or slow like most
Pete says
PDUK outsourced complaint company have written to me saying the need various bank statements to determine if they lent responsibly or not. Also want me to obtain and send them a copy of my credit report. I have asked them to continue their review of my complaint and I’ll provide any such information to the Ombudsman if they require it. My view is if PDUK don’t already have sufficient information to show they lent responsibly then they can’t say they did.
Lisa says
Im in the same boat so interested to know too….
From experience PDUK were quick, but that’s because the FOS didn’t add on any further loans, so only around £250
Nigel says
So after rejecting Sunny’s offer I have heard nothing. Sent off to the Fo yesterday. Does anyone know approximately how long it will be before I hear anything? Thank you
Helen says
I sent my Sunny complaint to FO early October, had my adductors decision two weeks ago. (Sunny is yet to respond to adjudicator…)
Michelle says
Hi, I have sent in an irresponsible lending request to Speed Loan (Known as Herbert Brown at the time) who have replied with the following:
“Your cheque cashing roll over loans had not been issued by Speedloan Finance Ltd but instead were issued by Albemarle & Bond & Pawnbrokers LTD (A&B). A&B used to be in the same group as Speedloan finance but was a separate company.”
They are denying any responsibility and have also informed me that A&B went into liquidation.
Can anyone help me in checking if this is actually correct? The name of the branch was Herbert Brown and the loans were from 2007-2010. Thank you in advance.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
I think it probably is correct – you can discuss the complaint with the Finanical Ombudsman to confirm.
Vicki Martin says
I had payday loans from 1st Stop Recoveries in the past, and put a claim in early 2017. They declined it, so I went to the Ombudsman. I finally received a letter from the Ombudsman on 16th December, so advise they agreed that 1st Stop Recoveries owed me money, and the company would be in touch within 4 weeks with an offer. If I had not heard anything by then, I should contact the Ombudsman again.
The 16th January 2018 came around, and I had heard nothing, so I contacted the Ombudsman. They advised that I should given them more time due to the Christmas period. A little frustrating, but hey ho. A week went by and still nothing, so I emailed the Ombudsman again.
Today, I received an email from the Ombudsman to say the reason I had received no money was because they dissolved on the 16th January.
Anyone else had this and any idea how and if I will be able to get any money back?
Thanks
Dan says
I was recommended to drop my case by an adjudicator in mid December as basically the time they have to allow the company to respond would of meant the just didn’t respond and then I would of been left with nothing anyway, so I dropped mine. Whilst I’m not an expert, I don’t think you will be able to pursue anything now.
The named director still operates the similarly named companies but think he is covered enough by rules and regs that you wont be able to claim against
sorry, must be a tough one to swallow – I hope an expert comes to give you a potential solution…
Richard says
Hello has anyone had dealings with Uncle Buck? They are refusing my complaint loan taken out six years ago on the grounds that they delete all their financial information after 5 years and therefore have no evidence to suggest correct or otherwise of their affordability checks.
Thanks Richard
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Send it straight to the Ombudsman. Firms can’t wriggle out of paying refunds by deleting information.
Samantha says
Hello
I have recently accepted an offer from QQ and the adjudicater. Today they forwarded me this-
I’ve now asked the business to get in touch with you directly to arrange what we agreed – so I won’t do anything more unless I hear from you. But if the business don’t contact you within four weeks – or there are any problems – please let me know.
Is this normal procedure? How long doe it normally take?
Thank you
AK says
I think it’s a pretty standard email from adjudicators. I received one exactly like this after accepting the offer from Satsuma. I phoned Satsuma to check if they received all they needed for the payment and they sent me a cheque in less than two weeks after adjudicator’s confirmation email. QQ payment time may vary
Lisa says
Same – QQ were quick for me. Paid out within less than a week from memory
Matt S says
How long is too long to wait for communication from the Ombudsman service? I received a provisional Ombusdman response on 10th January with regards to a complaint I have against Nationwide. I replied on 16th January with a few questions I had, and now almost 2 weeks later I’ve still not had a response. I’ve sent follow up emails to chase up on 3 occasions and have had no reply or no acknowledgement. I am unable to phone due to work commitments so email is my only available method of contact. I have had plenty of contact with adjudicators etc over the past couple of years and have never gone nearly this long without any sort of reply. The deadline for further information was 24th January and this has now passed so I’m worried they are going to issue a final decision without responding to my questions first.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
It doesn’t sound that long but I can see why you are feeling anxious. Apart from sending yet another email, all I can suggest is that you somehow need to find a way to phone the FOS up on 0300 123 9 123 and ask to speak to the team manager.
Lisa says
I also had something similar so did phone my adjudicator.
He spokogised for not replying, however, as he knew I had responded (even though it wasn’t dealt with) that in effect stops the clock to give them time to work through the queries.
I don’t think you have anything to be anxious about.
I raised queries with my PDUK complaint with my adjudicator back at the end of Nov and these are still not resolved. (12th Dec was the date)
He emails me every few weeks to say hes busy and he will get to it eventually.
Lee says
Does anyone know how long Uncle Buck take to payout once they have agreed a settlement figure with Adjudicator. They have had 25 days of the 28 so far. Due to pay me by this Thursday 1st February at latest.
Got a horrible feeling I’m going to be waiting much longer.
Anyone has refunds from Uncle Buck recently?
Jackie crawford says
Hi
I’ve just received an email from Uncle Buck to tell me they are not upholding my complaint. They state that even though I had repeated loans, they knocked me back on higher amounts I was after and gave me lower amount loans which showed they did act responsibly. They said they carried out credit checks wich showed no adverse credit even though I was in an Iva plan. I was wondering if you were fobbed off by them in a similar way before you went to the FOS. Thanks
Lee says
Jackie refer your Uncle Buck compliant to the FOS. Ignore what they say.
They fobbed me off. Only because I went to adudicator they backed off. Just not paid me yet.
NG says
To those who have had a case upheld against Lending Stream, I wanted to know if they correct adverse credit marks or simply delete the entire record.
Any knowledge on the subject would be greatly appreciated.
Lisa says
I specifically agreed with them that they would delete. Not sure if this is standard (and still waiting for the update) but I have a feeling their standard is just to remove based on the wording.
Ash says
Just an update on mine complaints
Mr Lender – Settled within two weeks, not full amount but a good sum back
Peachy – As Above
Cash Float- Offered £150 GW on £1800 interest paid, countered and waiting response, given until Friday to reply or going FOS.
PDUK – Rejected Complaint, gone to FOS, interest around £800
PDE – As Above, interest around £500
Satsuma – As above, interest around 2.4k
CASH ASAP – Took 4 weeks to acknowledge complaint, yet to receive borrowing summary I have borrowed around 14k, I believe interest to be around 2.5K
Safety Net – No response as yet, borrowed 30k, interest 5k
Wonga – Awaiting response, interest 2.1K
Myjar – Awaiting response, interest £800
Trusted Quid – Awaiting response, interest 1.2k
Lending Stream – Awaiting a response, interest £300
Sunny – No Response, awaiting Borrowing summary
The wait is quite frustrating, all have 3 weeks left to respond.
Nesta says
Hi,
I just want to say thank you to Sara and everyone else on this site. I have successfully complained with:
Sunny
Mr Lender
Satsuma
SafetyNet Credit
MyJar
I’ve recouped over £3000 from them all in interest i paid. My advice is to pursue this all the way. A couple of my complaints were rejected notably by Satsuma and SafetyNet Credit, but once i raise with the FoS and provided my bank statements the adjudicator ruled in my favour and they agreed.
My bank statements were a mess, with gambling transactions in but this only helped my cause as the more i borrowed the worse my addiction became. I was embarrassed to share this but without it the FoS wouldn’t have been able to see all the facts. So please share everything you can.
I’m now close to being debt free and have succesfully closed all my gambling accounts and in 2 weeks i will be 3 months bet free.
Without this site, maybe i would still be looking for my next £100 loan only to gamble it away in the hope of landing a jackpot. Thank you to everyone who helped me
Nes
Dan says
Congrats on the 3 months Nesta – I’m just approaching 300 days, most prolonged effort on my part after a 20+ year gambling addiction that nearly broke me, feel fantastic to be winning at last
Ella says
Congratulations to both of you on your successful claims and more importantly on your bet free time. Enjoy being debt free :)
zoe says
Congratulations Nesta just over 2 years for me bet free and life is great, just hoping when I send my bank statements off to the FO that it wont go against me. well done on your time off and claiming money back.
Peter says
I have received a final response from QuickQuid/P2P (Casheuronet) today with an offer of £16 :) – I paid over £4k in interest to them for loans taken out between Nov11 and Dec14. I took a total of 22 loans, and never went more than a 30 day period without having a loan with them during that time, I’ll highlight some points from there reply;
They would expect constantly increasing loans in order to cover prior loan and interest, and I never had more than 4 consecutive with less than 15 days between loans.
The fact is I was regularly taking out 3 consecutive loans with increased amounts where I was drawing down loans within 15 days of each other, but that’s clearly irrelevant if its less than 4 based on there comments. To me, that’s an admission that they shouldn’t be allowing increasing amounts at all? Do you think I would still have a case for loans where the principal has decreased? Its worth noting that I was using Wonga and Sunny at the same time and was probably using there increasing loans to help me. I haven’t made CashEuronet aware of that so I will add this to my response telling them I have referred my complaint to the FO.
All of there other responses are pretty generic referencing affordability, creditworthiness and hardship. Although the reason my complaint was upheld and I was offered my £16 was due to a loan I missed a payment on in 2012. Surely, they didn’t consider this when reviewing further loans?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
oh this is all QQ’s weasel words to try to make any case seem poor. If you went nearly three years borrowing every month, just ignore what they wrote and send it straight to the Ombudsman. It doesn’t matter if the amount sometimes went down, the point is you couldn’t get through a whole month without borrowing again.
Peter says
Sara, thank you for the response, clearly they’ll try to twist each scenario to come across as all scenarios are not irresponsible lending – straight on to the ombudsman on this one. I will keep you updated on this as well as my complaints with Wonga and Sunny.
Also, thank you for the resources on the site, I certainly wouldn’t have pursued this without it, its clearly helped a lot of people get redress for irresponsible lending.
Kara says
Peter, I received a very similar response from QQ (same excuses, same offer) and have sent it on to the ombudsman. I’ll post updates on here.
Lisa says
I had almost the same.
I let them know that I was going to FOS. Around 6 weeks later they wrote directly to the FOS with a full refund + 8% :)
Steve says
I have had an offer for my Pounds to pocket loan. I only took one loan for £950 and they have upheld my complaint offered £18 but!the issue is that I didnt pay all of the loan back not sure how much and its sitting with DCA. They have said they will retrieve the loan back and credit it with the £18. So I might just ignore this offer and drop the claim?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Why would you do that? I can’t see you have anything to lose by sending this to the Financial Ombudsman to look at.
Steve says
Ok will do that no, thanks for the advice sarah ????
Kyle Milne says
Hey guys
Quick question
Cash4unow yet again (refused to help me when I asked for support multiple times on this loan and previous loans) after a call to the ombudsman for updates on case file allocation they told me that the time frame for Cash4unow to provide their case file has now passed and they haven’t provided their case
What is the situation I am in now to be honest they are the single worst company Iv ever dealt with and have been a direct result in me borrowing more due to the lack of support in previous loans and this one Iv just stopped paying
Jon says
I’m calling 118 Money tomorrow. Non of their email addresses are working. I think this is quite deliberately evasive.
Wonga have gone quiet, Sunny send automated phone messages. Nothing from QuickQuid.
Jon says
Update:
I called 118 Money who’s servers are rejecting my complaint emails. The tone was outrageous, I think they are wilfully trying to avoid a complaint in writing. They only wanted to talk about my balance.
I filmed the call on my iPad with the phone on speakerphone. She was quite arsey until I mentioned that they had an obligation as a responsible lender for me to be able to contact them in writing.
I’ve told them that I’m not paying a penny until they’ve acknowledged receipt of my unaffordable lending complaint. I’ve given them to the end of the week on this or I am going straight to the Financial Ombudsman. I explained that I was filming the call, she dropped the attitude after that.
I’m pretty sure not allowing people to send an email is in breach of their agreements with the FO?
Any advice welcome.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
You can get caught up in arguments that aren’t going to really help you here. The important thing is that you sent your complaint to 118 money using the email address shown on their website and you have now confirmed it by telephone.
Dan says
Shop direct (Very) no longer allow email via closed accounts so I reverted to pigeon post, I recommend you do the same, recorded delivery, safe your references
Very much doubt not allowing email is a breach of anything other than customer service
Jon says
My account isn’t closed. The fact they don’t want to aknowledge a complaint is evasive. I ll post it, but in the 21st century? Sunny and Wonga have been fine.
Sally says
Hi Sally,
I have a loan with Amigo loans, I plan on making a complaint but still want to pay while the complaint is going through as I don’t want to cause any trouble or hassle for my guarantor. My question is if I persue this complaint will my gaurantor have to be involved
Sara (Debt Camel) says
No, if you win the complaint then the amount you owe should be reduced, if you don’t then you just carry on making the payments.
Can I suggest that the Money Shop refund and any others should be used to clear this guarantor loan? That is the simplest way to escape from Amigo’s clutches… it won’t harm your complaint against them.
Sally says
Thank you for your advice Sara, has people had much success with claims from amigo loans.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
There haven’t been that many complaints, so it’s hard to tell the success rate.
EDIT in 2019 Sally won her case against Amigo after going to the Ombudsman
Sarah says
I have recently sent a complaint in to the fco for 3 payday lenders, QQ responded to me advising that the complaint is outside of the complaint handling limit as some of the loans can date back as far as 2007!.. The adjudicator has got in touch with me asking for bank statements for when the loans were taken out, payslips, credit file etc.
Due to the timescale, 11 years on, I have no record of any of this, will this affect my case as I know I had many loans with these companies over the years which led me to enter a dro which was closed in 2015.
Any advise would be greatly appreciated.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
I think you need to talk to the bank you were using to see if you can get old bank statements.
Sarah says
Hi Sara
Do you think it is likely the bank will have this information as I was under the impression that they didn’t need to keep files for any longer than 7 years ????
Maureen says
Not to get your hopes up…I got full bank statements for the last 7 years from NatWest but they could only give me a transaction history for anything older which wasn’t sufficient for the FOS to uphold those loans as for debit card payments (which a lot of payday loans were paid back by) it didn’t show the company name like it does on full statements, therefore they were unable to see that at that time I had loans with other lenders. Just thought I’d let you know my experience, hence why I have now said that I want them to look at my quick quid complaint and ignore the ones over 6 years as they are unlikely, in my case, to be upheld due to the lack of full statements. You can only really make your decision once you see what the bank can get you as Sara said.
Kara says
Hi Sarah. I’m in a similar position; loans with QQ since 2007 and my bank have only been able to provide me with statements from end of 2011. I have all my wage slips & full statements from other payday lenders at the time so I’m hoping that the constant borrowing, increased amounts & the info I can piece together from old loan agreements & my credit file can go some way to help me. Payday Express have just offered me a refund on nearly all loans dating back to the same time so it’s really annoying that QQ are being so tricky. I’m sending further info over to the FOS tomorrow so I’ll have to see what they make of it.
Good luck.
Sarah says
Well I called my old bank Santander this morning & I couldn’t have talked to a kinder, more helpful lady. I cringed when I asked what the chances & more worrying what the costs would be of 5 years of statements dating back from 2007.. When I was told yes 100% possible & even more unbelievably it would cost nothing I nearly fell of my chair.. So hope has not gone just waiting for post 2009 to turn up in 3-5 days & then the others to follow.
Just wanted to let others know that it is possible with some banks & I think more importantly with people that wish to help.
Kara says
That’s good to know. I’ve tried mine 3 times to no avail. However, I’ve checked my other bank account that I use for direct debits and I’ve printed off statements from 2007. It’s not ideal as it doesn’t include everything but it has reminded me of loans that I had forgotten about & there are loads of bounced direct debits which I guess could go in my favour. I’ve also made a table of all payday loan deposits and repayments which shows that some months I was paying ridiculous amounts.
Davy says
I actually called into both the Co op and RBS today and both advised me that the furthest they can go back with statements is 7 years (Jan 2011) Happy to accept that as unsure if I have PD loans prior. Both banks said they could do historical payment sheets but pretty sure someone on here stated that they were no use. The good news is that I got all the statements for free. The girl in the Co op stated that it was £2.50 per statement (45 statements) but told me she had a code she could in put to prevent any charges. She was heartily thanked for that!
Louise says
I received an offer from Wonga, which I have accepted. I emailed my acceptance form back on the same day, and phoned to check they received it.
Does anyone know how long they take to issue the refund?
Thanks
John C says
Normally its around 2 weeks
Carlie says
A big Thank you! Such a helpful site.
I read the articles, comments and case examples multiple times. I made notes on key points that related to me and tweek the letters to make them personal.
The main reason for complaining was to get defaults/late payments removed asap. I just thought any refund would be a bonus.
Wage day advance – I had 4 loans in total. The offer was £287 plus interest . I calculated I had paid about £700 in interest. I could of pushed further but as my main objective was to get the default removed asap.
Piggy Bank – I had 4 loans. The original complaint was rejected. I responded saying that I disagreed, saying that I had rolled two of the loans and I was allowed to increase the amount each time. They should of noticed the pattern and spotted that I was becoming dependent on the loans. That I also had an arrangements and late payments in place at the time of these loans. I ask them to re-visit my complaint. They came back to me in less than 24 hours. with a new offer of £241 plus interest for loan 4. I worked out I paid £410 in interest. I accepted.
Sunny – Still awaiting a response
My Jar – Still awaiting a response.
I just wanted to say, just go for it. You can not be any worse off. If they try to fob you off don’t listen. Calculate the interest you have paid so you have a rough ball park figure in your head.
Good Luck Everyone!
Adam says
Hi there,
So I’ve taken at least 80 payday loans in the last 9 months, constantly taking others to pay them off and spiralling out of control again mainly due to gambling.
I ended up consolidating almost all of these into Guarantor loans, where my monthly repayment is currently 75% of my salary. So I’m struggling to say the least.
Due to this I didn’t actually pay much interest on the payday loans, as I got scared and consolodated them all into Guarantor loans ASAP.
I was wondering if anyone had some advice on
A) Am I still entitled to something from Wonga (19 accepted and paid loans in 9 months) and Sunny (16 accepted and paid loans in 8 months)
B) Is there a way to file complaints to Amigo, Buddy, Bamboo, George Banco successfully without hurting my guarantor?
Thanks!
Sara (Debt Camel) says
You can complain to Wonga and Sunny and ask for a refund of the credit nterest you paid – if that wasn’t a lot, you won’t get a big refund though. Still worth doing!
Also complain to any other payday lenders you used more than once. Every little helps!
Sara (Debt Camel) says
You can complain to the guarantor lenders. 75% of your salary is clearly too high! Expect these complaints to be rejected and to have to go to the Ombudsman.
You do need to keep up the payments while the company mplaints are going through otherwise they will go after your guarantor.
Are you sure your guarantor could afford all the loan repayments? It doesn’t matter if they own a house, they have t have enough income to afford the loans otherwise the loans weren’t affordable for them and they too can out in a complaint and ask to be removed as guarantor.
Pol says
Sorry to post this here but I just have a quick question about my jar. They seemed to have blocked my account and therefore I can’t get on to see my borrowing history from them. What should I do ?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Ask them for a list of your loans.
Dan Williams says
Hi Guys,
Thanks so much for you help on here, I have managed to get loans wiped from my credit file and refunded some interest back!!
Any idea on timeline for a final response from Wonga?
I complained to Wonga, on the 7th of December but I am still waiting for a response from them. I only had an email on the 4th of Jan saying they had a back log but nothing since.
Kara says
I submitted a complaint to Wonga at the same time & haven’t had a final response either yet. They confirmed that they might not meet the 8-wk deadline and will let me know if that’s the case.
Dan Williams says
I had my response this morning and have now send the complaint to the FO.
Nicola Handley says
Woohoo my adjudicator have found in my favour on loans 17 to 66. And they have to pay 8per cent on top of the loans wonga have till the 14 of next month to replay to him.hopfully they don’t drag it out.thank you to this site for all the help
Shirley te says
My adjudicator has ruled 20 loans in my favour and I’m supposed to hear back by tomorrow that’s with payday express there ain’t much write up about them on here hope they play fair and I get what I’m owed
Kara says
PAyday Express have just offered me a refund on 23 out of 27 loans (they rejected the first & 3 others that were cancelled with no interest paid). It took them just under 7 weeks – no further info required. I know all complaints are different but I think they are one of the easier firms to deal with.
Shirley te says
Great news payday Express has offered me full refund as agreed with my adjudicator just sent my details off so should be refunded in few days I’m so chuffed it’s made work a lot happier today £3.300
Pol says
Tried to get onto my myjar account to get a list of all my past borrowings but they blocked my account. I rang them to ask for the list and they told me I need to pay ten pounds to have it sent and it’ll take 40 days for it to be sent once they receive payment. Scandalous
Eva says
I emailed my jar requesting list of loans and told them I’m not asking for SAR and had it emailed back the following day. I did email every lender my bank statements,credit reports and spreadsheet of all lenders i had at that time to speed up the complaint (i know some people dont do that). I also have to say I then heard nothing till about 2 days before the 8 weeks when they came back with final offer. They did ask if I considered it first which I refused. They were very quick to address my points and had swift replies to my emails. They were also easy to negotiate with. Got £1250 out of £1301 which i was happy with (didnt upheld first 2 loans which is fine). Glad i didnt have to go to the ombudsman. Good luck
Vikki Hick says
Hi, I have number of complaints in with the FO at the moment, I was asked to provide bank statements, which I did, and then last week got an email from an Adjudicator asking me for my incoming and outgoings for a particular month. Have sent that back so just wondering if anyone else knows how long it may take from here?
Thanks
vikki
Maureen says
Depends on which lender, whether any loans over 6 years and whether you have complex income and different outgoings during the period in question. Straightforward cases maybe 6/8 weeks for an adjudicator to look at it….one of two of mine were quick but most have been since April last year as I had different income each month due the overtime and moved 3 times during the period of the loans which meant different outgoings. All but two of mine have now been recently settled but Quick quid and wonga outstanding to be looked at as some loans over 6 years
jordan says
would like to thank sara and everyones stories on here that helped me gain my goal satsuma got back to me this morning with a decision to rebate me £2156.53 and are also taking any defaults of my credit file i am closer to a stress n debt free life my advice is to follow through and do it yourself the letter template helped me a lot so glad its over
Lisa says
Hi All,
Had an outcome from an adjudicator yesterday on my PDE complaint. PDE original advised that 4 were lent responsibly, 2 were unable to determine, and 3 were irresponsible.
Following a review by the FOS, they have advised that 3 – 9 were irresponsible, so 4 more than the original outcome.
If you are not desperate for the cash, and think you have a good case, then hold out for the FOS. I’m awaiting the figures, but think this takes it from about £500 to around £1100 and all bar 2 removed from my credit file.
I am still fighting for capfin and PDUK (along with Vanquis). 247Moneybox are being their usual non-responsive selves so this is awaiting the Ombudmen.
So far I have received £2200 and expecting a further £2260 to come in at least.
More important, every loan that had a default (8 in total) raised against it has been found in my favour and my credit score is most definitely on the up!
Shannon says
Sent settlement form back to adjudicator for my Sunny complaint. Anyone had refund from them recently and if they took full 4 weeks to pay out.
Vicky says
I had my refund from them within 4 days
Donna says
Hi, I sent a letter of complaint to payday uk and payday express. Payday uk say that due to my loan being 6 years old they are not going to consider it and that I should have complained back then- I didn’t know that I could complain until now! Payday express are asking for bank statements and payslips! Do I have to send them? I don’t have them and don’t particularly want to send them! Thank you for your help and for this site.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Send payday UK to the Ombudsman – they are just being difficult. tell Payday Express you want them to consider your case as it stands.
The Ombudsman will want to see bank statements, but these can normally be obtained, even from closed accounts.
Eva says
I had my loans with them from 2008. 2 in 2008 which they didnt upheld (fair enough) but from 2009 they upheld them. They didn’t even mentioned anything about over 6 years old. Good luck with them
Pete says
PDUK sent me an offer of just over £1,000 today which is most of the interest I paid. Still waiting on Wonga, QQ and Lending Stream. Thank you to this site for the template letter help.
Jon says
Well got an offer from Cash Genie of £45 plus stat interest from 2011, small amount but only had one loan from them so isn’t too bad really. Does anyone know when the next cheque run is likely to be? I have seen its due about beginning of Feb, would I be right in saying that? Cheers
Jen says
I’m also waiting on the nxt Cheque run I sent an e.mail asking if they have any idea when this will be, this is what they said, so just need 2 wait
Sorry, but I won’t have a date for you until RSM notify me of who’s payments are in the next payment run and when this will take place.
As soon as I hear about a payment date for you, I will be in touch, but until then, there is no further information that I can give you.
Tom says
I tips on dealing with Safety Net Credit? Are they just the same as any other payday loan company?
I used their ‘service’ over 80 times between Jan 2016 and December 2017 with loans totaling 6k and have sent them a complaint today using your template.
Thanks in advance. Tom
Sara (Debt Camel) says
If you still owe them any money you MUST cancel the CPA with your bank. They have the sneaky habit of saying they are putting your account on hold for 30 days then taking the full amount due.
Jo says
Yes, with Safety net credit you have to ask them to cancel your CPA. I sent my complaint to them, asked them to stop collection but they continued so I called them and cancelled CPA.
Jo
Liam says
Can anybody help?
I made a complaint against Sunny and they made an offer which I accepted. The Complaints Handler said that if I send him my bank details it will take 3-5 working days to process.
I have sent these over and contacted him a few times by email but he now isn’t responding. I’m only asking how long it takes for the refund to go in my account and it has been more than 5 working days but nothing.
Has anyone has this happen to them before and how long does it take to receive the funds?
Dan Williams says
Hi Liam,
I had an email on the 30th saying they would issue a refund within 3-5 days as well. Obviously not expecting mine yet but starting to get worried seeing your post!
Have either of you guys had any luck in chasing them up?
Dan Williams says
Just as an update, if you have the name of the person that has been dealing with your complaint you can email them directly (rather than going to the compliance@) using the example below:
John Doe would be Jdoe@elevatecredit etc (NB that is not a real person at Sunny so don’t use that address!)
Hope that helps! I have dropped mine an emailing hoping for an update. Will let you know if I get a reply!
Dan
mdc says
Hi all
I have 3 at the FOS which i sent all the bank statements and credit file as requested to towards the end of November.
Quick Quid
Sunny
Wonga
I totally understand how busy they are, and the service they provide. I was wondering if anyone had a rough idea of when they may come back with offers from the companies.
Thanks
Eva says
I have the same. All 3 with FOS. Got acknowledgment from them that they have requested info from the lenders. My complaints were submitted online: PD Express 4/1/18 and picked up by handler 16/1/18 and PDUK and QQ 5/1/18 and picked up 18/1/18. Noww it’s a waiting game for the companies to supply all documents. Once the case file is complete then I was told it will be assigned to adjudicator (they could not say how long this will take). I know its nerve wracking but hold it will be worth it in the end
Oh and my Lending Stream which i submitted 15/12/17 doesnt seem to be there. I called them (please do they are the nicest people you can ever speak to and ask about your complaints being received) and they confirmed there must have been online glitch because they couldn’t see it ( even I have pdf saved of the form). The lady told me exactly what to do about it and also went through the process how it all works. I was scared to call but honestly as soon as she said few words panic disappeared.
Han says
Hi Sara , Received my final response letter from PDUK I had 21 loans in total and they are saying 12 of them where lent responsibly and the other 9 they are unable to determine. They have advised i can sent in bank statements for the 9 and they will review this. What shall I do send it all to the FOS or let them review the 9?
Thanks
Hannah
Sara (Debt Camel) says
If you would be happy with a refund on just those 9, then send the statements to PDE – but if you wouldn’t then you may as well skip this and send the whole case to the Ombudsman.
Han says
Do you think if I send over bank statements I would get anything back? I am thinking of sending it all to the FOS as I don’t see how they can rule out 12 but not the other 9?! Would you recommend I send the whole lot to the FOS with bank statements?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
I think a refund on just 9 loans doesn’t sound very good – that is the maximum you would get by sending the statements to the lender so yes, I suggest you send your complaint about all your loan sto the Ombudsman.
Pete says
HI Sara,
Received an email from Wonga today with a final response to my complaint. They have decided to uphold my complaint on 13 of 26 loans and offered just over £2100. They have said they can’t look into any over 6 years and courts and FOS will also not be able to do much with loans older than 6 years. Is this the case and should i accept this offer?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
So you had 26 loans in total? Are they refunding all the loans that are less than 6 years old?
Pete says
Hi,
Yeah i have had 26 over all, 9 from 2011, 1 of which they will refund, 11 from 2012, 10 of which they will refund, 1 from 2013 which they have not mentioned, 4 from 2014, 2 of which they will refund and 1 from 2017 which again is not mentioned.
John C says
Update on Lending Stream complaint.
Complaint went into LS in July where it was rejected pretty quickly. Complaint went into FOS in September. I understand LS missed every deadline given to them (no surprise) and in at the start of Jan it still hadn’t been picked up by an adjudicator. Next thing I heard was 17th Jan when an adjudicator contacted me with his proposal to LS. Complaint was upheld for loans 4-14 which I reckon just under £1k in interest. LS took the full 2 weeks to come back (after some chasing) and rejected the adjudicator’s findings, but giving a counter offer of a refund on loans 4, 5, 7, 10, 11 & 12 and saying they would take no more money for loans 13 and 14. Would be great except 13 and 14 were paid off and no money is owed anyway, and 6 and 8 were the 2 biggest loans on the upheld list, with 9 the next largest! LS try to misinform the FOS all the way along, there should be some form of punishment for this
Unsurprisingly I’ve rejected their offer of £180 and asked for an Ombudsman to look at it. I’ll update once I have a response
vickie9 says
You’re in for the long haul with LS i’m afraid. By far the worst payday lender i’ve dealt with but stick to your guns. Let an ombudsman decide. Mine agreed with my adjudicator’s findings in November but it still took them until the middle of Jan to pay out! Nevertheless they did pay up and it was worth the wait. Good luck.
AK says
Vickie, did they include the interest in their settlement offer? My adjudicator told me they accepted his findings but they in their response they quoted the interest amount only as the total refund and didn’t specify the simple interest. I asked for the breakdown but they ignore the adjudicator and my deadline for the settlement is tomorrow. I am afraid to accept their offer as I think they might try to settle for less than they should.
vickie9 says
It did yes but I spent a good deal on the phone sorting it all out. Three of my loans had been sold to MMF, initially they wanted to give me a larger figure and let me deal with MMF myself! I got there in the end but I found ringing them was by far the best way of dealing with them & then getting it backed up by email. It took ages, was very frustrating but they got to the right decision in the end. Good luck
AK says
Thank you very much. I phoned them today and they promised to send breakdown to the adjudicator tomorrow. They couldn’t tell me the amount of simple interest added as they did not calculate it yet but confirmed that the figure they quoted was refund of the interest before 8% added. Luckily I don’t have any loans outstanding. But tbh I was surprised in first place that they accepted the adjudicator’s findings and I dudn’t need to go to the Ombudsman.
Shirley temple says
Anybody know how long payday Express take to pay out says within 30 days if only it took that long to get the loans off them
Maureen says
Well it appears that for the last two days no one is answering the phone in customer relations….it just rings for two minutes then cuts off. I had an ombudsman decision and they said they hadn’t received the settlement form the FOS sent them, which I know has been sent as the FOS confirmed this. This was 14 days ago!
Shirley temple says
It’s not on at all I’ll be ringing them incouple of days there soon enough to get folk in debt
Kara says
I had my offer last Friday and had been asking for 7 wks for a complete statement of accounts as they kept sending me incomplete ones. After not being able to get through on the phone I tried the main number as opposed to customer relations & they transferred me. The woman I spoke to got my statement sent over immediately despite me having been told 5 times previously that the appropriate dept were dealing with it. Just persevere & keep calling til you get someone who’s helpful!
Shirley temple says
My adjudicator ain’t asked me to sign nothing he just ast for my bank details and said get back in touch if they don’t refund you
Ella says
I accepted an offer from them at 7 weeks and the money was in my bank eight days later after both emailing and posting the reply form. I also asked for email confirmation for my records. They say once they have the signed form back at their office it is up to ten days for payment.
RF says
Good Afternoon
Firstly I just want to reiterate what an excellent and informative site this is. I got into issue with this around 2010-2013 so have sent of complaints to a number of payday lenders.
I only sent my complaints on 2nd Jan so still well within the 8 week period (that being said Lending Stream have already rejected my complaint and it is now (i believe) with the ombudsman).
I just have 2 queries that I would like advise on:
1) All companies (with the exception of PayDayUK) have at least sent an acknowledgement of my complaint. Should i be concerned that after 4 weeks I do not even have an acknowledgement of the complaint from them?
2) I submitted my Lending Stream complaint to FOS via their online form. Again I have not received any ackowledgement of receipt. Do they normally email / post out confirmation and if so how long does it take?
Pamela says
Hi can someone tell me how to word it to the financial ombudsman?
Shannon says
All you need to do is upload the original complaint you sent the company to the FOS case when you make it. Then when it asks what the issue is and how you want them to put it right just ask they view the original complaint letter.
That’s all I have done and it has been fine.
Linda says
Hi I’ve had quite a few complaints and went into a bit more detail once it had been assigned to an adjudicator at the FO so they had a clearer picture as to my finances at the time and more importantly my problems and reasons for lending etc some of which were personal. They do ask for evidence on top also took into consideration the additional information I had forwarded to them without judging.
Jackie crawford says
Got some great news today
Myjar upheld my complaint without going to the FO refunding me over £2000 in fees and charges. I still owe over £1900 so it’s being used to pay that off, my credit file will be amended and there is £157 left going into my bank account.
I then got an offer on one loan from Sunny for £26 despite me having loans totalling over £4000 with them. I’ve declined this offer and will be sending it to the FO
I can’t thank Sarah and debt camel enough, such a weight lifted off my shoulders and I think a nice little takeaway is on the cards with some of the refunded amount. Thankyou all so much so inspirational
graham says
Below is my loan history with quidmarket :
18/06/2012 £225 30/06/2012 £289.13 30/06/2012 £275 31/07/2012 £361.02
16/08/2012 £325 31/08/2012 £417.63 08/09/2012 £375 28/09/2012 £481.88
22/10/2012 £225 31/10/2012 £289.13 02/11/2012 £375 Rolled over £127.30
30/11/2012 £365 Rolled over £149.02 31/12/2012 £355 31/01/2013 £474.88
05/02/2013 £375 28/02/2013 £481.88 07/03/2013 £375 28/03/2013 £483.15
11/06/2013 £300 28/06/2013 £385.50 07/09/2013 £375 30/09/2013 £481.88
14/11/2013 £375 29/11/2013 £481.88 02/12/2013 £375 31/12/2013 £492
31/12/2013 £375 Rolled over £126.56 31/01/2014 £365 28/02/2014 £474.65
28/02/2014 £375 Rolled over £136.56 31/03/2014 £365 30/04/2014 £483.63
01/05/2014 £450 Rolled over £150.67 30/05/2014 £440 Rolled over £158.50
30/06/2014 £430 31/07/2014 £575.13 31/07/2014 £475 Rolled over £158.49
29/08/2014 £465 30/09/2014 £627.80 17/03/2015 £541 over 4 months 30/06/2014 £828.00
09/07/2015 £400 over 4 months 30/10/2015 £640.0
05/11/2015 £750 over 5 months 10/08/2017 £1341.00
graham says
I have been given a final response and they have partially upheld my complaint does this seem reasonable sarah ? dont know if to accept it or not.
28/02/2014 £375 Rolled over £136.56 £126.56 £ 38.8
31/03/2014 £365 30/04/2014 £483.63 £118.63 £ 35.68
01/05/2014 £450 Rolled over £150.67 £140.67 £ 41.38
30/05/2014 £440 Rolled over £158.50 £148.50 £ 42.67
30/06/2014 £430 31/07/2014 £575.13 £145.13 £ 40.72
31/07/2014 £475 Rolled over £158.49 £148.49 £ 40.72
29/08/2014 £465 30/09/2014 £627.80 £162.80 £ 43.50
Sub Total £990.78 £283.56 Total £1,274.34
Sara (Debt Camel) says
It doesn’t look that good to me although I can’t tell what some of the figures are. Back in 2012/3 you were borrowing or rolling over every month – why haven’t they refunded those loans? And they have also missed off the last large loans. You could try going back to them and saying this is inadequate and saying how much you would be prepared to accept – have you added up how much interest you paid on all the loans apart from, say, the first 3? If they refuse, I suggest you send the case to the Ombudsman.
graham says
thanks sarah, i have sent a reply : Thank you for providing me with my complaint final response. I believe the offer of redress is inadequate. As Cleary seen by my borrowing history between 2012 and 2013 I was borrowing or rolling over every month and this should have raised a red flag. An offer I would be willing to accept is for the interest and statutory interest of loans between 16/08/2012 to 07/03/2013, 02/12/2013 to 29/08/2014 and my final loan on 05/11/2015. I would also ask these loans are removed from my credit file.
Thank you for taking the time and dealing with this matter, you help is greatly appreciated.
Below are a list of loans stated above:
how long do you think i should wait for a reply before i raise it with the ombudsman ?
Sara (Debt Camel) says
If their response to you was labelled as a final decision (did they say you had the right to go to the Ombudsman?) then I suggest giving them a week.
graham says
yes they did say i had the right to go to the Ombudsman and provided me details to do so.MOk i will keep you updated thanks again for the help.
John says
Hi All
Sent through an email on the 6th of Jan 2018 to The Money Shop informing them of my wish to make a complaint regarding irresponsible lending and requsted a statement of account. On the 30th of Jan, received a final response letter from TMS not uphelding my complaint and still there was no statement of account included with the letter, instead there was an account summary showing total amount borrowed £5200 and total repaid £7900.The reasons they have given for rejection is that some of the loans I have complained about were from a long time ago and their records about what happened at the time were not complete! However they only investigated whether they had treated me fairly and they concluded they had done so since the money i had repaid was reasonable compared to the money i had borrowed according to the FCA standards.
Finally got the statements yesterday and it is 7 pages long!
I took out a lot of payday loans with the Money Shop between 2008 and 2012, i constantly borrowed every month for very long periods of times and would sometimes rollover the the loans several times ,I counted one loan i had rolled over 22 times! I had several defaults on the loans and would incur charges.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
That sounds like an excellent case to send to the Ombudsman. The Money Shop is paying out on older loans. Good luck!
John says
Thanks Sara, wouldn’t they want to pay out earlier than drag this out since they have incomplete records?It’s strange that they have complete & incomplete records for others who lent at the same time?Its the same company same policies& procedures. I know individual cases are different but I get the feeling they might be deliberately choosing which cases to pay & which to drag out.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Wondering about this doesn’t really help you. If the branch you borrowed from is still open, going in there and asking for a statement has worked well for some people.
John says
I got my SOA last week after repeated emails and calls. TMS did not uphold my complaint reasons were they had “incomplete records “ since my loans were from a very long time ago 2008-2012. I don’t know what they mean by that ? my SOA shows all my borrowing history. Had 69 loans with them . Preparing for FOS
Nicki says
They sent me the exact same, I replied informing them that my complaint was about irresponsible lending and for that reason I will be escalating my complaint to FOS. Just to give you a heads up I referred my complaint in September and it still hasn’t been allocated to an adjudicator
John says
Thanks Nicki for the heads up and everyone else who has commented. Good luck and hope your case gets picked up soon by an adjudicator. It’s encouraging to note that Money shop is paying out on older loans but frustrating that they have now come up with this “ records not complete “line. I will be taking mine to FOS.
Sally says
The money shop is paying out on older loans. I put in a complaint and they refunded me on loans from 2008-2012. I got to say they were fairly quick with my complaint.
M M says
Hi Sally, I agree totally. They paid out on older loans and I did not have to go to FOS or send any bank statements or payslips or anything. They did take 15 weeks for me from initial complaint but it was worth it!
Sally says
Just to update you, my complaint with The Money Shop took about 3 weeks from start to finish. I put my acceptance letter in last Monday and I had my refund in my bank yesterday afternoon.
Jodee says
So far I have had a £706 refund from Uncle Buck, that was after one email. I had to send Lending Stream and Wonga to the FOS, who decided in my favour, LS were told to pay loans 5,6,7,8 and 9 but offered loans 4,5,7 and 9 (obviously loans 6 and 8 were the largest with a total interest of around £800 alone) so I refused and have passed to the Ombdsman now. The adjudicator for my Wonga claim has advised them to refund loans 5 – 22, do Wonga usually go with the adjudicator or am I likely to have to wait for an ombudsman decision on this too?
Gary says
Hi Sara,
I currently have numerous complaints lodged with the FOS in connection to various payday lenders, all of which are being upheld at adjudicator level.
My question is something slightly different, I have pawned an expensive watch consecutively over the last 4 years, I always pay the pawn loan back but then end up pawning the watch again straight away due to the debt cycle I was in, where each time I’d use a payday loan to Pay off the watch. Are you able to raise an affordability complaint against Ramsdens about this or is this senario completely different?
Thanks
Sara (Debt Camel) says
The affordability rules don’t apply to pawnbrokers I am afraid. I hope you get enough refunds from the payday lenders to reclaim your watch and never need to pawn it again – you must have paid a fortune for it over the years.
Scott says
Hi Sara
I have agreed to a settlement with SNC via the adjudicator whereas they will refund 12+months worth of interest and charges + 8% and remove negative markers from credit report. I signed and emailed back the acceptance form to the adjudicator last week but there is a minimum payment due on my account in the next few days. Should I pay this and let SNC adjust the figures when they refund me OR should I just leave it now the acceptance form is signed?
Scott
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Will your outstanding balance be cleared by the refund?
Scott says
Yes, then I receive the remainder into my bank.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
in that case I suggest you cancel the payment.
Christine Wilson says
Hi I wonder if you could help. Since 2016 I have continuously borrowed with Sunny, at first it was a godsend helping me in a difficult situation but quickly grew and now I need to borrow more or less every month. I have outstanding loans with them now. Are these classed as payday loans and do you think I would be able to complain? I am worried because I still owe with them
Many thanks
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Yes, these Sunny loans are “payday loans” even if they are repaid over several months. The facts that you have been borrowing most months for over a year and sometimes have more than one loan at a time show that these loans aren’t helping you, they are trapping you in debt.
Unless you can repay your current loans and not need to borrow again (sound unlikely!) the best way out of this trap is to:
– cancel the CPA to Sunny
– tell Sunny you can’t afford the repayments on your current loans and that you want to be able to repay them with an affordable amount each month
– put in a complaint to Sunny about unaffordable lending using the template letters in the article above.
If you have a lot of borrowing from other lenders or credit cards, it would be a good idea to talk to StepChange about your overall position, see https://www.stepchange.org/Howwecanhelpyou/DMPDebtmanagementplan.aspx.
Tim says
Hi all, has anyone any experiences with 118money? I had 3 loans with them simultaneously at the time I was in lots of debt. The 8 weeks are up this week. Do they generally reject or refund & if they do refund do they tend to drag it out a while? Thanks
Jen says
I only sent my complaint off to them last week, didn’t realise how much I paid, loan of 2000 I repaid early after 6 months with a loan from my parents to save in interest, turns out the figures to settle was 1999.42, despite paying 958.02 to them already I had only actually paid off 58pence of the loan, gutted, didn’t think they charged that much, complaint sent, let me know how u get on
Tim says
Yes they are extortionate. I had 3 which were all repaid early but as you say even when you’ve made payments there is a lot of interest.
James says
Hi Sara,
I had a reply from Lending Stream recently. They agreed to close 3 loans and with the remaining two they would freeze interest and id just have to pay back what i borrowed in an affordable amount. I replied accepting this, they cleared the 3 loans. I have now emailed them atleast 3 times with the payment details of what i wanted to pay monthly, which day and bank details. They are just blatantly ignoring me. I havent paid anything towards the remaining balance as i had their offer and was waiting for them to sort this. Now it is in arrears and affecting my credit i assume.
What do you suggest i do?
Thanks
James
Sara (Debt Camel) says
When did you accept their offer? And did they agree that there wouldn’t be any negative marks on your credit record for the 2 you are repaying?
James says
They said for the affected loans so im assuming that meant the 2 remaining. They just said they would report all activity of it to the credit agencies. But now i cant get a reply from them about anything
Sara (Debt Camel) says
OK I suggest you email them and say you are sending your complaint to the FOS next week if they haven’t (a) got in touch with you and (b) confirmed that no arrangement to pay or default markers will be added to your credit record for the two loans you are repaying. It is a shame you didn’t clarify this at the time.
Robert says
Hi,
I have had so many Payday Loans over the years (Thankfully not any more), I’m not even sure where to start. It got to the point as with many here rolling over time and time again and I would Imagine thousands in interest. Where does one start I have no idea on dates and times as they were over many many years and companies. Looking at the list of companies I know for sure I had loans with 17 of them!!
Regards
Rob.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Just send in the complaints to 17 companies then! Well check the list of emails, some of them may have gone out of business :( See https://debtcamel.co.uk/payday-lender-email-addresses/. If you want, start with the ones you know you used a lot, but if any of them may have been coming up to the 6 year point, just get those complainto in asap.
You are going to need to get your old bank statements for the FOS – with that many lenders quite a few are likely to have to go to the FOS so get prepared. You can get old bank statements even from closed accounts. But don’t delay putting your complaints in while you get these.
Lee Heylings says
I received an email from FOS saying QQ should refund all my loan interest from Aug 2012. I am trying to work out simple interest with the help of your website, but one year i borrowed more than i paid. How does that work on the simple interest rule.
It’s just so i can get a rough idea.
Also QQ had me down for only 8 loans when in my statements i have 30 as i had a flexi account too. I have pointed this out to the FOS but just a bit worried now QQ try to offer me only what loans they say i have, not the flexi loan amounts.
The good news is that FOS say QQ did not do enough on my account to see my lending habits. I have to wait until the 9/02/2018 for QQ response.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
You need to be very sure the flexi loan is included in the “refund all interest” decision before you decide to accept it. Sometimes the flexi loan needs to be handled as a separate complaint, but this has to be clear.
You have to work out the 8% interest by loan, not by calendar year.
Kim says
Satsuma shows on my credit file as having entered into a DMP in November 2017, when it was actually January 2017. How do I go about getting this changed to reflect the correct date? Thanks in advance.
Sara (Debt Camel) says
See https://debtcamel.co.uk/debt-default-date/. But are you making an affordability complaint to Satsuma? If you are and the last loan is termed unaffordable, then any negative marks are deleted from your credit record, so there is no point at the moment in worrying about whether the default date is correct.
Kim says
I have made a complaint and Satsuma agreed to refund interest and charges but only as a gesture of ‘good will’. I asked the adjudicator about my credit file and they said that as they hadn’t upheld the complaint and there was still £300 left to pay then they wouldn’t remove it from the file as it was still an active loan. The adjudicator advised me to speak directly to satsuma once I’d paid the loan in full to see if they would remove information from credit file. I’ve since spoken to Satsuma and they won’t!
Sara (Debt Camel) says
That’s very annoying. I am afraid you should have insisted on the case going to the ombudsman.
allan says
Have had two offers this morning from payday lenders of redress, anybody give me some advice as whether or not to take them?
lending stream offered me £1283.99, I had loans in total of £7450 over 5 years
Also payday uk offered me £990.91, I had loans in total of £4980 in one year.
Not sure how much interest I paid in total with these loans, should I try to figure it out? To be honest, I am a bit in shock to get these offers without the FOS getting involved.
Thanks in advance
Kara says
Allen. Just as a point of comparison, I had loans for 2 years with PDUK totalling £4370, and the interest was £2600. Obviously your own situation depends on the loan amounts and periods etc, but it’s definitely worth checking. The statements that they sent me detailed the deposits and repayments (showing both the principal repayments and the interest repayments). Have they sent you your statement?
They offered me £1300 so I’m taking it to the FOS.
Christopher Aitchison-Knight says
Hi Sara, I have 3 small loans with THL Ltd, the latter of which remains unpaid and with a physical cash value of £240. In response to my complaint they say they see no fault but are willing to talk to SLL as the debt stands currently at £2042.36 – This is the very account that SLL already said some months ago they wouldn’t proceed against. Should I take this to the ombudsman?
We have been in touch with SLL Data and we were informed there was a outstanding balance of £2042.36 we assume that this balance means you have made no payments on the loan? Regardless of this we know your last loan was for £240 from us so the balance must be made up of charges and fees charged by the third parties over which we have no control.
Kind Regards
Chris
Sara (Debt Camel) says
So SLL have already agreed that they won’t ask you to repay this? Is this in writing?
Christopher Aitchison-Knight says
Hi Sara, Yes they have
Sara (Debt Camel) says
Well I am not sure you will get anything from going to the Ombudsman. If your first two loans were small and the third one has already been sorted.
Nicki says
Hi Sara this might interest people who have a complaint against the money shop in store cheque Loans, I have just received this information from the FOS
We are currently in the process of investigating. However, we’ve come across a potential issue regarding complaints about The Money shop and the cheque based loans they provided at the time you were borrowing. This issue has affected several cases, and is in the process of being resolved by one of our ombudsman.
While we don’t have an exact date for when this will be resolved, we are hoping for a resolution as soon as possible. As soon as we have an update, I will be in touch.
John says
Hi Nicki, thanks very much for the update.It is starting to make sense now because, I felt the Money Shop had decided to reject my complaint from the onset despite the fact that I have got a reasonably strong case against them.Thank you Sara for setting up such a very useful and informative site, it has stregnthed my resolve to persevere with my case.
Kyle Milne says
Soooo to further carry on from my previous post one of the single most nicest guys every (adjudicator) has spoken to his manager to take care of my cases to prevent further financial hardship
But he accepted one of my tiny loans which I didn’t expect which is great and my qq he has partially accepted
Tim says
Very shocking reply from 118 on the last day of the 8 weeks.
No mention of credit checks and the fact my file was littered with payday loans etc. Basically says I’ve committed fraud by providing inaccurate information, which I did, as many others have to obtain the funds. States the welcome call and I&E form on application is sufficient, though verification of any of these details were never checked to ensure they were accurate. Would imagine FOS will be quite concerned by that response. One of the worst I’ve had, behind cash4unow.
Kerry says
How long do wonga take to actually issue refund I accepted there offer 9 days ago and I have not heard anything from them since.
Any advise would be great
Martin says
Hi Kerry, someone asked the same question a few days ago so I looked up these details to help.
Offer received – 13/12
Sent acceptance – 15/12
Confirmation email from them settlement was being processed – 18/12
Received transfer to bank 27/12
Obviously every case will be different but if you haven’t received any confirmation they received your acceptance it might be worth an email now after 9 days to check.
A&P says
Update on an complaint with Wonga.
Received response today (final day of the 8 weeks) upholding my complaint.
Offered me refund on 5 out of 20 loans totaling £1,149.47 plus £395.19 (8% extra net) – Total £1,544.66
These were all the higher value loans and I calculated I’d paid a total of £1939 in interest. All of my loans were taken between Feb ’11 and Dec ’14.
I’ve reluctantly accepted there offer as most of the loans there not paying were taken before the 6 years and I’d prefer to go without the hassle of dragging those on.
Still have complaints with QuickQuid/Pounds to Pocket & Sunny – both referred to the ombudsman. Wouldn’t be getting a penny without your help Sara, this is very much appreciated.
Jodee says
Do Wonga usually agree with the adjudicator or am I likely to have to go to the Ombudsman?
Ant says
They won’t respond it will go to the Ombudsman you’re in for a long wait unfortunately.
John C says
That’s not true at all. There are plenty of examples where Wonga have accepted an adjudicator’s decision without going to an Ombudsman. Mine included. It all depends on what they believe in your case as they don’t seem to have a set rule for accepting or declining. It is however pretty likely that they won’t respond to the adjudicator in the timeframe given, so it depends on how quickly you want to push it up.