Nine months ago the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) took over the regulation of the consumer financial credit market from the Office of Fair Trading (OFT). One of the big issues that they decided to deal with first was to reorganise the lenders offering ‘High-Cost Short Term Credit’, payday lenders included. The new rules for payday […]
Monthly Archives: April 2015
Financial Conduct Authority: What do they do and why?
The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) is a body that has been created to regulate and standardise over 50 000 firms in the UK. The FCA is not a government funded institution but rather is funded by the businesses that they regulate. The aim of the FCA is to: The financial industry maintains a certain level […]
Some of the largest payday companies are feeling the sting of new payday legislation
It looks like, for all intents and purposes, that the payday industry is struggling under the new payday legislation. The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) regulated the business at the beginning of the year and now requires that all payday companies are registered in order to trade. Other regulation, such as a 0.8% cap on interest, […]
Payday loans in Scotland: Exploited employees often have no choice but to take out a payday loan
It is now impossible for a Scottish citizen to challenge their boss. Since fees for Employment Tribunals have been introduced for those Scots who have problems at work and need mediation, the number of complaints has fallen by 81%. Where once it was free of charge to challenge one’s employer before the Employment Tribunal, it […]
It is March 2015; the problems should be sorted out, but the payday lenders are still being harassed
The FCA (Financial Conduct Authority) is still complaining that customers in arrears are still not being treated fairly by payday lenders. The particular regulator that took over from the CMA (Competition Markets Authority) in early 2014 alleges that it has found: “Serious non-compliance and unfair practices” in all the lending companies that they examined. As part […]
Is the UK able to find an innovative replacement for payday loans the authorities love to malign?
As of January this year, the UK has seen an enforced cap on payday loans. What was once an APRs of 4,000% has now been reduced to 1,200%. This seems like a lot but in the end if you take out a loan of 200 pounds you will only be paying 1 pound less than […]
Since January 2015 the cap is on, and perhaps we start to say goodbye to payday – what now?
As the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), Ombudsman, and Competition Markets Authority (CMA) took it between them to cap the payday industry, few legitimate payday companies have survived. Reminiscent of the old medieval torture the screw are being tightened once again. The CMA is now demanding that payday lenders provide competitive information to their customers on […]
December 2014 saw some exceptionally bad publicity for payday loans in Wales
The population of Wales was shocked this past December when a young man in Swansea committed suicide. Courtney Mitchell Lewis, otherwise known as Mitch to his friends, allegedly killed himself because of payday loans that he had taken out and could not repay. Mr. Lewis had borrowed 100 pounds earlier in the year and had […]
Nobody wants to end Payday debt misery more than the bonafide payday companies themselves.
The largest payday lending corporations, some even international payday lenders, have been the first to cooperate with the new regulations that were introduced in January of 2015. These firms are legitimate financial institutions and beg to operate in the same way as other financial institutions. The only difference between them is solely that the payday […]
Payday loans in Scotland: Exploited employees often have no choice but to take out a payday loan
It is now impossible for a Scottish citizen to challenge their boss. Since fees for Employment Tribunals have been introduced for those Scots who have problems at work and need mediation, the number of complaints has fallen by 81%. Where once it was free of charge to challenge one’s employer before the Employment Tribunal, it […]