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Can anyone explain to me about car balloon payment thing?

2 replies

BertieBotts · 13/08/2020 11:37

It doesn't really matter, but I feel annoyed because I don't understand why this has happened and I would like to understand.

We are in Germany but going on the assumption that things are likely to be mostly the same as the UK I thought somebody might know.

We bought a car on finance 3 years ago. At the time we were told that at the end of the finance period, we would have about 5k left to pay. We were given an exact figure.

3 years later the letter comes around advising us we have three choices - swap the car (and make a new finance agreement), pay off the same exact figure in full on X date, or extend the finance.

We have decided to swap the car, but since we never got any response from the original bank when we asked how exactly to do this, we just went to a different more convenient to our current address dealer and went from there. Now we're at the process of selling the old car through this dealer, we've agreed to a price, and we needed to get a document from the financing bank, which we have done. Now the document has arrived and it is advising us of the closing amount which is suddenly €40 higher than the original amount! It's not a penalty, because it specifically says that it includes an early payment penalty of €0.

We are coming up to X date, are past the last monthly payment on the loan, so I don't understand why we suddenly have to pay €40 more.

Can anybody shed any light? I know €40 in the context of €5000 isn't really very much but I just don't get it! And I couldn't understand the guy on the phone well enough to ask.

OP posts:
blacktop · 13/08/2020 11:40

The only way you can have this question answers is to ask the company who have applied the extra charge. Nobody here, particularly in the U.K. when you are in Germany can answer you.

BertieBotts · 13/08/2020 11:55

Oh, I thought perhaps it was a normal/standard thing, oh well. I guess I will never find out because I am not bothered enough about it to chase them! I did try to ask but it's harder speaking a foreign language on the phone than face to face.

OP posts:
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