Can someone please talk me through this credit agreement? Interest rate/apr

[DaanSaaf]

I have a credit agreement through a company who are due to do some home improvements. During the sales pitch, I was encouraged to take the loan over 120 months rather than 60, as if needed one month I could pay the minimum which is obviously lower on 120 months. I was told that the minimum payment would be £76, as the interest rate is 7.9. I was also told I could pay as much as I want per month without penalty, as the 7.9 is applied monthly and therefore the sooner I pay it the cheaper it'll be.

The credit agreement tells me interest rates and apr which are different, and the monthly minimum is based on the apr. I've tried reading up but I'm confused, could someone please tell me if I've been lied to? I planned on paying it of within a few months and have absolutely no intention of paying back over 11k on a 6k loan. Thanks

I can't help with explaining the difference between APR and interest, but was in the same position with agreeing to a credit agreement that bared no resemblement to the conversation I'd had. Mine was for soffits and guttering.

Once I reaslied what had happened I attempted to cancel, but the company refused. I did some research regarding how credit agreements should be sold, and what info should be available up front (i.e. what you've posted) before you sign anything, amongst other things. The APR shouldn't be a surprise now, which tells me you weren't told at the time. There's also a specific cancellation policy that should be refererenced in the contract, and if the wrong one, the whole contract is null and void.

I went to my local Trading Standards who were brilliant and communicated to the company on my behalf.

If you want to cancel, you need to tell them asap especially if they've taken the measurements as they could claim they've already made them.

Unless they’re qualified financial advisers they shouldn’t be encouraging you to take one option over another or presenting benefits of one option - they should simply present the facts for you to make your own decision.

You can complain about mis-selling and escalate it to the FOS if the company don’t sort it out. www.which.co.uk/consumer-rights/advice/i-think-i-ve-been-mis-sold-a-financial-product-what-can-i-do-aip8d7D9P49A

There should have been a cooling off period too (where you can cancel) - did the company give you the option to waive this so they could start making the windows asap though?

www.citizensadvice.org.uk/debt-and-money/borrowing-money/cancelling-a-loan-or-credit-agreement/

Thanks, I've had RL advice and am cancelling both the work and credit tomorrow. I'm within the cooling off period. I'm just glad I read everything before the work started, conning bastards.

7.9 is flat rate which is quoted because it looks a lot cheaper than the APR of 13.9%, which is more representative of what it costs.

Can you cancel the finance and get a personal loan from your bank, which should be cheaper, instead?