Payday lenders need to lower their high fees

Malcolm, Dead right.
Payday lenders (essentially loan sharks) do not need modifying they need eradicating.
These parasites prey on the desperate and stupid and although you could argue the victims have only themselves to blame remember it’s the rest of us taxpayers who end up paying out to salvage the mess. It’s the taxpayer who pays when the bottom falls out of the victims world in the form of benefits etc etc. So getting rid of parasitic payday lenders will directly or indirectly do everyone a favour.

Government money spent educating the “financially challenged”, either challenged through desperation or stupidity, would be money very well spent, and financial competence should also be a subject on every school curriculum.

Wavechange, “About all that can be said for payday loan companies is that they are regulated”. As we know from major banks, for example, there is poor regulation. Payday loan regulation appears not even worth that description – it allows vulnerable people to be ripped off without sound advice being given – something they appear to have been stopped from doing in other countries.
We have said several times elsewhere – the best way to minimise financial problems is to learn how to manage your finances. Why is guidance not being offered widely to help people with this? Another new conversation knocks banks for the opacity of charges they make for “unauthorised overdrafts”. Why should we be condoning unauthorised overdrafts when authorised ones can be arranged if you are a suitable candidate? Somehow we need to get a culture of helping those who genuinely merit it, and providing guidance with responsible spending. Start in school, but for many this now needs to come from elsewhere.

Poor regulation can at least be improved, but surely it is better that desperate people go to established companies rather than loan sharks operating illegally. I did suggest that advice should be given before loans are handed out, and also that the crazy advertising that makes payday loans sound like a good idea should be banned.

We might be able to tackle payday loans and their extortionate rates but I’m even more concerned about the large number of people living on credit, though governments past and present seem to have done little to address the problem.