A year ago in New Hampshire payday and title loans were outlawed to “protect” consumers from the interest rates. This however did not completely stop all lenders from being able to offer additional types of short-term high interest loans to consumers.
Today the house will vote to amend the proposed bill which would put a 36% cap on annual interest rates, including some fees for any loan under $10,000. This would apply to loans and personal lines of credit. According to the Concord Monitor the vote is for a bill meant to close what some consider to be a loophole in the law. As there as been much controversy and disagreement regarding the bill which was originally discussed in the house two weeks ago with a recommendation that a bipartisan majority believed the bill to be overkill. The new proposed amendment to the bill would cap the interest rates at 36% while allowing additional membership fees, late fees and participation fees. These fees could only be charged one time and the banking commissioner would have the authority to determine what fees are fair.
Often time consumers with bad credit or in a time of need have no where else to turn for a quick loan and these lenders were filling the demand for these loans. If the loans were taken away, this would leave many people without other options. Hopefully, a decision can be agreed upon that not only has the consumers best interest in mind regarding the interest rates, but also in times of need and being able to access quick short term loans when necessary. Leadpile is watching what happens in NH………….

As of January 1st 2010, a new payday lending law was imposed in Washington. “The new law limits the size of a payday loan to 30 percent of a person’s monthly income, or $700, whichever is less. It also bars people from having multiple loans from different lenders, limits the number of loans a person can take out to eight per 12 months, and sets up a database to track the number of loans taken out by people.” This will be something that lenders will now have to pay attention to.
Leadpile will be watching the status of Washington and payday loans, because we work with publishers nationwide, and we will be interested in any legal changes that happen in this particular state.

Steve Beshear, Governor of Kentucky, has renewed his efforts for putting an interest cap on payday loans. The new limit that Steve Beshear would want in place is 36% for every $100.00 lent. This is the same cap that people in the military have on their payday loans. The main reason for the cap is because of the hard times that residents in Kentucky are having just to put food on their tables.
Currently, no new payday lenders are even allowed to open in Kentucky (the state has 743 lenders at the moment). Some believe that such a restricted cap will cause lenders to go out of business. What do you think?

The government of Ontario is expected to announce on Tuesday a set amount that payday lenders can charge per loan. Globeinvestor.com is reporting that a new rule setting a maximum of $21 in charges per $100 borrowed will take effect soon. This new rule will be in addition to the rule requiring the lenders to be licensed.
This new rule set to go into effect tomorrow will cause major changes in the Ontario payday industry possibly causing some lenders to go out of business.
The LeadPile team will be watching this closely and will keep you posted on any updates or changes!

It seems new payday lending laws will be taking effect in January in the state of Washington. The new laws will limit the maximum loan amount to $700, or 30% of the consumer’s monthly gross income, whichever is less. There is going to also be a limit on the number of loans a consumer can take out to 8 loans in a 12 month period of time. One other stipulation implemented in this new law is that anyone who is in default on another loan, or still paying back a loan, can not take out a new payday loan starting in January.
My question is…. will these new regulations limit the number of leads that payday lenders purchase in this state, or will they still be interested in extending loans to consumers in the state of Washington? My guess is they will still very much be interested in obtaining payday loan leads from Leadpile and other lead providers in the state of Washington. Consumers need these short term loans and payday lenders should still be the ones providing them to the consumers.

The FDIC has released a report showing 30+ million people have little or no access to banking services. Unfortunately, this study is also highlighting the fact that many of these consumers are poor, immigrants or minorities. According to NPR news, “In all, 25.6 percent of U.S. households either lack bank accounts or use payday loans, check-cashing services and other costly alternatives to traditional banks, according to the survey.
The report is part of an FDIC effort to bring the so-called “unbanked” into the financial mainstream.
FDIC Chairman Sheila Bair said access to a bank account gives households “an important first step toward achieving financial security.” Vulnerable families need the ability to save for emergencies and borrow on affordable terms, she said in a statement.”
The one thing that really needs to be pointed out about this report is the fact that it talks about many people who do not have banking services, yet they are using services such as payday loans. In reality, a consumer generally can not get a payday loan if they do not have a checking account. There might be some lenders that allows no bank account, however most do require it. So, I am not sure payday loans should be in this article when speaking about the “unbanked” consumers??????

The Thanksgiving rush is now over, and retailers seem to be pretty pleased with the Black Friday results. However, now Cyber Monday is here and the kickoff to online shopping has begun. Internetnews.com is reporting sites such as Amazon.com and Walmart.com to be the potential big winners. Time will tell who is going to be the big winner this holiday season. Web sales only represent a small portion of the holiday sales, however year after year more and more people are turning to the internet for their shopping.
Leadpile is hoping to capitalize on some of this increased web traffic with some additional lead generation. Payday loansare in high demand, and we are hoping some will see these short term loans as an additional way to potentially purchase their much needed Christmas gifts.

In recent news in AZ, payday lenders are working with an former AZ attorney general – Grant Woods to try and keep payday loans from being eliminated fully in the state. In a recent vote the short terms loans had been voted to be eliminated, however some are trying to prevent this from happening. A local AZ paper is quoting that some payday lenders have hired a local company whose owners are advisors to the AZ governor, so this looks like they are really trying to win this battle this time. We all wish the people in AZ (Leadpile’s home) luck with winning this battle.

FDIC has rolled out some new programs for consumers. Some selected banks feel that low to moderate income consumers don’t have enough options. Therefore, some banks that are participating in the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp programs are offering some “special” types of loans to consumers. These loans are for those that don’t necessarily have good credit (because their credit is not pulled) and are not able to get a standard type of short term loan. Wallstreet Journal Online is reporting this great news for some consumers that are not able to get quick cash and are considered “under-banked”.
Some statements that some might question are comments such as, “Fees and interest paid to payday lenders and banks for overdraft protection contribute to a larger problem for low-income individuals–those types of loans don’t help build credit scores.” Are even some banks now trying to come up with programs that compete with the payday loan, and are they really trying to find some alternative options for consumers? I guess we will never know, but the one great thing is we are seeing some alternatives being offered to our nation’s consumers that need short term cash. This is exciting for Leadpile to see, and hopes all other banks will follow.

Canada is no longer an out of the way market that U.S companies do not want to do business with. Many of the hot Canadian companies are all coming together to try to sell themselves. These agencies are going to be traveling around the United States to show marketers that cities like Montreal and Quebec are the ideal new hot spot for market testing. Why is this? According to adage.com, “its language barrier prevents much outside media from seeping in, and vice versa — makes it an ideal place for U.S.-based marketers to experiment with new ideas and approaches before rolling them out to wider audiences.”
Several larger companies such as MasterCard and Mazda are way ahead of the game and have been utilizing Canada as a test market for several years now, both with great success. By testing in a smaller market with a smaller budget, marketers are able to see what works and what does not with out throwing their whole budget out the door. This also allows companies to try a more “out of the box” method.
LeadPile is a head of the game when it comes to working in Canada. Currently we are generating Canadian payday leads in Ontario. We are finding great success generating leads in Ontario and have plans to expand to some of the other Canadian markets.

In recent news, there are new payday lending laws in British Coumbia Canada. With these new regulations there are caps on interest rates and rules prohibiting predatory lending.

B.C.’s Business Practices and Consumer Protection (Payday Loans) Amendment Act and the Payday Loans regulation prohibit lenders, including phone and Internet lenders, from:

· Practices that unreasonably increase the borrower’s debt load, including rollovers that require borrowers to pay significant extra fees for extending the time to pay a loan.

· Requesting an assignment of wages, or collecting from a borrower’s employer.

· Operating unless licensed by Consumer Protection B.C.

Leadpile Lead Exchange has recently started generating payday loan leads in Canada, and is very much concerned with any legislation that is going on there. Just like US payday loans, we know that payday loans can be a much needed loan for many consumers. We will continue to try and match these consumers that need these short term loans, with those that can provide it to the consumer.

Payday loans are something that we discuss a lot on this blog, and are happy to let our readers know that we are expanding our payday loan/cash advance market into Canada. There was a high enough demand to warrant Leadpile to venture into this fairly unsaturated market. We are proud to be able to help those in Canada get connected with those lenders that want to provide them with one of these short term loans. If you are already a Leadpile publisher, you can access this new offer in your seller account. If you are not currently a part of the Leadpile Marketplace, contact us immediately!!! We look forward to this great new market that we are now venturing into!