Credit, Collections & Insolvency News
The latest Bank of England household interest rate figures reveal the cost of borrowing continued to increase in June across consumer credit products following a warning from the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) for people in financial difficulty. The analysis from Freedom Finance found that average credit card rates jumped to 21.43% and are now approaching…
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Analysis from Freedom Finance has found that the retail store and online credit sector experienced its fastest ever start to a year in 2022 and looks set to reach further highs this year, Monthly updates from consumer finance trade body, the Finance & Leasing Association (FLA), show that new business volumes reached £2,120 million in…
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New figures released by the Finance & Leasing Association (FLA) show that consumer car finance new business volumes fell in May 2022 by 4% compared with the same month in 2021. The corresponding value of new business grew by 6% over the same period. In the five months to May 2022, new business volumes were…
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New figures released by the Finance & Leasing Association (FLA) show that consumer finance new business grew by 20% in May 2022 compared with the same month in 2021. In the five months to May 2022, new business was 28% higher than in the same period in 2021. The credit card and personal loan sectors…
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Buy now, pay later (BNPL) finance firm, Payl8r, is calling for the adoption of open banking as a legal requirement for credit assessing in the same way that credit checks are, to ensure safer lending for borrowers in the face of rising costs of living. Payl8r says open banking technology connects banks, third parties and…
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Consumers cut back on credit card borrowing in May, according to figures from the Bank of England. Consumer borrowing fell to a four-month low of £800 million in May, from £1.4 billion in April, with May’s total also below the pre-pandemic average of £1bn. Analysis shows that credit card loans accounted for £400 million of…
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UK Finance has announced three new appointments to the UK Finance board. Erin Platts, Head of EMEA and President of UK Branch, Silicon Valley Bank; Ian Stuart, CEO of HSBC Bank UK and David Soanes, UK Country Head of UBS Group, have joined the Board. Joe Garner from Nationwide and Beatriz Martín Jiménez from UBS…
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UK Finance’s latest fraud report has shown that a total of over £1.3 billion was stolen by criminals through authorised and unauthorised fraud in 2021. The banking and finance industry prevented a further £1.4 billion of unauthorised fraud from getting into the hands of criminals. Unauthorised financial fraud losses across payment cards, remote banking and…
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The Financial Ombudsman Service (FOS) received nearly 25,000 complaints about current accounts in the year to March, more than any other product. FOS says a big chunk of these were from victims of authorised fraud, such as customers being tricked into transferring money into other accounts often by scammers posing as their bank. Complaints to…
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The impact of surging property prices throughout the pandemic has reduced housing affordability to the lowest level on record, according to new research by Halifax. The analysis – based on data from the Halifax House Price Index – compared typical house prices to average earnings across the UK. In the first quarter of 2022, the…
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Barclays has confirmed that it will acquire specialist lender Kensington Mortgage Company in a £2.3 billion deal. Kensington, which has 600 staff and specialises in offering mortgages to the self-employed and borrowers with more complex incomes, is being sold by private equity owners Blackstone and Sixth Street. The company originated around £1.9bn of mortgages in…
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Regulation of Buy Now Pay Later (BNPL) credit retail products could prevent up to 876,000 consumers from getting into unmanageable debt this year, according to new research from Barclays and StepChange. The study shows that the rising cost of living is having a direct impact on the popularity of BNPL purchases – over a third…
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The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) is using state-of-the-art analytics to scan 100,000 websites a day in a crackdown on scams and fraud. Although the watchdog cannot remove fraudulent sites, it has added almost 2,000 possible scams to its consumer warning list since May 2021- up a third more than during the same time the previous…
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