A couple of days ago I walked past the shop where the Salvation Army used to be - 176th Street closer to Highway 10. The store has been walled in half to make two shops and one half has big flashy signs all over the window for payday loans.
These types of establishments prey on unfortunate people who run out of money and need a loan to tide them over until the next pay day. They charge fees higher than a bank's line of credit and unfair loans. They tend to prey on people who are probably only working minimum wage jobs who have difficult times paying anything, let alone exorbitant fees and interest rates. Its a neverending cycle that is hard to get out of.
When I worked at the head office of a financial institution we received many chargeback requests. These were bounced cheques drawn on customer accounts from our institution, primarily paid to a payday loan company whose clients bounced their cheques and were hoping that our company might be able to make the cheque good. Usually these customers had no money in their bank accounts for us to withdraw and after a month we sent the cheque back to the payday loan company as an unsuccessful attempt to pay and I suppose it went to collection agencies from there.
There was a class action lawsuit in Canada a couple of years ago against Money Mart due to their high fees, that they lost, and their former payday loan customers are able to claim their losses, or a portion thereof, by following the settlement procedures that were published on their website earlier this year.
A few years ago Langley announced they would not allow any more of these places to open because they prey on the down and out in our society. I believe about 3 stores had opened in Langley prior to this change.
Last year a cheque cashing place did open in Cloverdale on the corner of 176th and 58th. They had a small sign outside "cheques cashed" and they offered Western Union services. They only stayed open for a few months. There is a learning centre or tutoring service now occupied that store.
I guess time will tell if this new establishment will suffer the same fate.
Just an update. I walked past this place mid-October 2012 and it was closed down with a "for lease" sign in the window.
ReplyDelete