Smarterbuys seeks to rescue Brits from payday loan providers
April 20, 2012A new website seeks to rescue lower income earning Brits from the clutches of payday loan providers by offering household goods at prices as much as 50 per cent less than recommended retail price.
The Smarterbuys site, operated by the Northern Housing Consortium, was designed to be the antithesis of high street retailers such as Brighthouse that offer hire purchase for household goods. Such hire purchase shops have been compared to payday advance lenders for the amount of interest charged to customers, which can sometimes inflate the cost of a purchase as much as double in comparison to a retailer that doesn't offer credit hire.
The new website, which also wants to encourage customers to make responsible financial choices and not resort to high interest rate short term loans from lenders that may be more interested in collecting fees than providing much-needed credit, will be open to anyone. Smarterbuys has plans to offer deals regularly and also provide customers without access to debit cards or prepaid cards to make a purchase online and then submit payments in cash at their closest PayPoint counter.
Smarterbuys says that it will also act as an encouragement to customers to seek out responsible lending through their local credit union instead of having to resort to taking out no credit check payday loans, which may be highly accessible but carry hidden costs and fees that can lead to runaway debt all too easily. If a customer takes out a loan from a credit union in order to pay for Smarterbuys' first deal, which will be a bed, then the consortium claims it will be £650 less expensive than if a consumer used funds from a payday loan or purchased it from a credit hire store.
Posted by David Bratt. Posted In : Pay Day Loans