This Lender Said Its Loans Would Help Tennesseans. It Has Sued More Than 110,000 of Them.
www.propublica.org
The Flex Loan, a type of payday loan pioneered by Advance Financial, has burdened low-income borrowers while generating huge profits for lenders. Tennessee lawmakers declined to rein in the lending business, even as other states did.

Reporting Highlights

  • Wave of Lawsuits: Since introducing the Flex Loan in 2015, Tennessee-based lender Advance Financial has filed over 110,000 lawsuits against its borrowers.
  • High Interest and Fees: Flex Loans offer borrowers up to $4,000 at 279.5% interest, trapping thousands of people in debt that can land them in court.
  • Sidestepped Federal Regulators: Advance Financial lobbied lawmakers to create the new Flex Loan to avoid federal consumer protection regulations.
  • Lyrl@lemm.eeEnglish
    11·
    1 day ago

    Salt in the wound: The default judgements locking in wage garnishment to pay illegal parts of the debt (on top of the immorality legal ones) because the kind of people who get these loans have many responsibilities and often can’t make an arbitrary court date, and it’s not clear to them the stakes are “show up or lose all recourse” (no appeals are possible).