In NY there seems to be some interest with potentially passing a law that would allow check cashing stores to lend money. The bill, they would call the “Short-Term Financial Services Loan Act”, would potentially allow registered check-cashing stores to make loans between $300 and $2,000 for 90 to 180 days. The loans could not be more than 25 percent of a borrower’s gross monthly income; installment repayments must be 10 percent or less. This could certainly benefit those frequenting the check-cashing stores that are paycheck to paycheck. New Yorkers are in need of this sort of short term loan because there are about 825,000 un-banked adults in New York City, according to the Department of Consumer Affairs, and this is something I am sure is similar in some of our nation’s largest cities. Advocates of this new pending law are wanting it to be known that this is NOT a payday loan, but it is in fact a loan with a repayment schedule that has installment payments within two days of a borrower’s payday.
No matter what it would be “called” it seems that there could be some additional resources for New Yorkers that are paycheck to paycheck. If a law like this is passed in NY, then will other states follow? We shall see… Stay tuned!

In recent payday loan news, the state of Colorado has passed a law restricting the APR on payday loans. The new law puts a cap of 45% APR. This is just following suit with some other states that have put some sort of restrictions on these short-term loans. Other states that have some sort of payday loan legislation or the payday loans are banned are the states of: AZ, AR, CT, GA, ME, MD, MA, NH, NJ, NY, NC, OH, OR, PA, VT and WV.
Many talk about installment loans or other short-term loan options. Is there going to be a transition from what we all know as a “payday loan” to something else to help those consumers that need the help? Either way, there HAS to be an option for consumers. If we want to call it payday loan.. installment loan, or whatever, consumers need to have somewhere to turn for unexpected situations that happen in their lives.

A new bill to be passed that would affect what information needs to be disclosed in both online and offline companies privacy policies.

According to The New York Times the proposed bill would expand what information should be considered confidential. Such information would expand to include, health or financial data, a users race or sexual orientation, the users precise location and any unique customer identification number. This bill could also include the users IP address.

Online and off-line companies would have to disclose a description of the information being collected and how it is being used in their privacy policies

Representatives Rick Boucher, Democrat of Virginia and Cliff Stearns, Republican of Florida released the draft legislation on Tuesday May 4, 2010. Both parties will collect comments on the draft in hopes to have a formal legislation completed within a month or so.

Consumer groups have been fighting targeted advertisements, which could be based on the internets users actions. Google and Yahoo have already adjusted their own privacy policies around this concern.

This “would be the first law that applies generally to businesses requiring privacy notice, particularly in the offline space” said Lisa J. Sotto, a partner at Hunton & Williams.

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.

With everything that has happened in the financial market in the last few years, many question if the responsibility falls on the consumer or the lenders (or both)? Is the responsibility of the lender to make sure the customer 100% know what they are signing, or it is the responsibility of the customer to ask questions if they do understand what they are signing? There are advocates on both sides, however the government now feels it needs to step in. NPR is reporting that Congress has drafted legislation that would allow the government to oversee all consumer financial products such as credit cards, mortgage loans and payday loans. This measure would prevent consumers from getting any sort of “loan” that they did not fully understand what they were signing. I am not quit sure how something like this can be regulated, but the government wants to step in and try to protect consumers in these sorts of situations. Many legislatures feel that the past behavior of our banks was that they would shop around till they found a lender that would take on their “unique” client situation. Unfortunately, what this caused was those “unique” consumers to then fall behind on their mortgages because they really can’t afford that mortgage.
No matter what, if you agree with government intervention in our financial market or not, the bottom line is our country needs something to change. The right answer is not always that easy to figure out, however one thing I do know is that to change our financial market there needs to be a combination of many people/groups that need to come together to protect customers…and sometimes protect the lenders (the good ones).

Washington D.C. lobbyist have some new priorities to take care of.  Payday lenders are working on a lobbying campaign to fight back on legislation that would put federal restrictions on the industry for the first time.

The Hill.com states there are new limits that will be presented for the first time at a House Financial Services subcommittee hearing today.  These lobbyists are getting ready to put their gloves on to prevent stringent federal regulations. The article goes on to say, “The Community Financial Services Association of America, the industry’s main trade association in Washington, is planning to raise more than $1 million from its 14,000 store members for a lobbying campaign this year. The industry expects to have 11 lobbyists working the issue in the Capitol, and is coordinating with online lenders and with some of the larger individual payday firms with their own Washington lobbyists.” Leadpile will be keeping an eye on the efforts of these lobbyist and hoping their efforts benefit the consumer. They are ultimately the ones that this is about, and if they want to take out a loan or use any other service, this should be something THEY decide on.

Washington is the newest state in the news with regards to payday loans.  According to the Seattle Times, “The House voted 84-10 early Tuesday to pass a bill that would require lenders to offer extended payment plans to borrowers who get in over their heads. The measure also blocks borrowers from receiving loans totaling more than 30 percent of their monthly income. The bill now goes to the Senate.”  Initially there were some provisions that would have limited the amount of interest the consumers had to pay, however that part of the bill was dropped.

Washington adds to the group of states that Leadpile Lead Exchange is keeping an eye on regarding payday lending laws.  Some of the other states we are keeping an eye on are AZ, OH, GA and a few others.  We will keep everyone updated.

NEW LAW IS A BENEFIT TO LEADPILE AS ANYTHING THAT HELPS THE CONSUMER IS A GOOD THING!

Sad days for those in AZ and OH with regards to payday loans.  Many are not sure how these initiatives lost in the voting, however they did.  This is going to affect a lot of brick and mortar stores located in these states.  This is a very large deal, because there are quit a few stores located in these states. Where do we go form here?

According to PDL blog, image might have had something to do with being able to get legislation passed on the payday loan industry. Did the misconception of a payday loan really have that much affect on those that were voting on these propositions, or did voting consumers really not want to have payday loans around any longer?  Now some lenders in these states and going to be closing down some of their stores. So how will this affect the internet payday loan industry? Will it be affected?
The good news is that some of these lenders that will be closing down locations, will now be looking at alternative options to offer the consumers. One of the alternatives is a short term unsecured loan.  This type of alternative will then be able to still provide some assistance to those that are in a temporary situation, but do not have the ability to get a payday loan or any other “bank” loan.

Time will tell.  I am sure all eyes will be on this industry to see if this recent legislation will affect what direction other states pursue……. or if there is a way to “try again” to get this legistration overturned.  Leadpile Lead Exchange realizes that there are consumers that really need assistance with their unforseen debt/bills.  We will continue to try and match up those consumers with the lender that can help them take care of this issue.  Loan modification, tax debt relief, debt consolidation, debt settlement, credit repair and others are lead types where we are trying to get the necessary help to the consumers.

According to paydayfacts.org, The Ohio Grocers Association has backed Ohioans For Financial Freedom. The group is stating that consumers are going through a lot of economic hardships, and taking away additional sources of financial help is not the way to go. The other aspect they are concerned about is the fact that if this legislation takes effect, 6,000 employees in the payday lending industry could loose their jobs, resulting in their bills and loans becoming delinquent ultimately affecting other financial industries. This group believes that consumers should be able to make their own decisions about borrowing money, and the government should not be making that decision.

Either way, the payday loan lead type is a very demanded lead type with Leadpile Lead Exchange.
We shall see if Ohio falls in the footsteps of some other states developing legislation in this industry.