Dodgy loan company taking my mums money - help!

[Bloodymoney]

Had a tearful call from mum today. Shes poorly with fibro and getting confused easily at the moment.

She was looking online at car finance, something called little loan company. She has put in her details to be allowed to see loans and they are persistently sums of money from her account, which she just hasnt got. Its left her really skint.

Obviously its a dodgy company on some level, but i suspect in the t&c there will be something about admin costs etc.

Her bank are being crap - wont even stop the direct debit that mustve been set up!

Can anyone give me a plan of action i can try to get her money back, any avenues of recourse, legislation etc?

Many thanks.

Another £70 gone overnight. As a result her car insurance hasn't been paid and shes overdrawn. Bank refusing to close account still or stop payments as she 'may have authorised' them. Shes telling them no don't pay them i dont authorise it, and they still persist. Played the taking it higher card just now and they are off to discuss it with management allegedly.

Have had a quick look at the website. According to the site, it does not charge customers any commission - instead it receives commission from the third party lenders. Are you sure your mother hasn't inadvertently taken out a loan? Can you check her emails etc?

If the bank can't help, can you contact your local Councillor or MP?

or could someone else have accessed her details ?

No she hasnt, definitely. The financial conduct authority explained it to me yesterday - the website acts as a broker and sells on the details, then each third party takes some sort of 'admin charge' to see if they fancy giving you a loan. The worst part is that the broker website is set up like a money supermarket type affair, checking a list of lenders. Its brought up 72 lenders for her - see where i am going with this?! They take a ten pence 'tester' so that the payment can be set up as authorised, then they go for the £70. Its not even illegal yet as its so new. The good news is that both the FSA and ombudsman are happy to take this on so if the callback from bank is not good news thats where we were at next. MP is a very very good idea.

that's terrible , but presumably she did enter her bank details online ?

Who are you dealing with at the bank? I would be on the phone to the fraud department and getting a stop put on the account and cards cancelled.

Which bank is it?

If you tell the bank the cards are lost they will cancel them.

This is absolutely shocking. I've never heard of this before. Other avenues to explore - how about trying the press? Local newspaper or national newspaper? Twitter too might be good.

Yea she entered her details at the broker site as part of a 'registration' type page. Just waiting for her to call me back. She lives two hours from me which is frustrating in situations like this.

I would also go to Money Saving Expert forum and post a thread on there - unlimited advice there too.

A surprising about turn from the bank!

The account has been closed immediatrly. A new account has been opened, all monies refunded and charges occurred have been waived.

Funny what happens when you start talking about the ombudsmen and the FCA isnt it!

Once again, many thanks for the posters here. A great help

oh that is fabulous - well done you.

Would it be worth installing Adblocker on your mum's computer? Free and no adverts so the likelihood of her clicking through to a company like that may be lessened too?

I can imagine my mother doing this as well.

Hopefully they stamp this out quickly, sounds like they were intending to take 70 x 72.

Your poor mum.

OP
Report that site to the Information Commissioner and the banking ombudsman.
They have NO UK contact details.
Their domain name is held anonymously in Arizona by GoDaddy