Wednesday, June 25, 2014

Empty Threats

Everyone has seen the TV adverts about payday lenders coming to the rescue of hard-up workers but it seems the ads are misleading. Wonga is the UK's biggest payday lender; in 2012 it made nearly 4m loans to more than 1 million customers, but it has recently been exposed as somewhat less than benevolent. 'Britain's best-known payday lender,Wonga, has been ordered to pay more than £2.6m compensation after it was found to have sent threatening letters to customers from non-existent law firms. The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) said Wonga had been guilty of "unfair and misleading debt collection practices". It said the firm would be compensating around 45,000 customers.' (Guardian, 25 June) RD

No comments: