Ever taken a payday loan? You may be entitled to cash from lawsuit
If you borrowed money from The Cash Store or Instaloans between before those companies declared insolvency, you may be eligible for a cash settlement as part of a $10-million class action lawsuit.
Jon Foreman, a partner with Harrison Pensa LLP, said there are 100,000 people who might be eligible for a minimum $50 award, and one-third of those people are in Northern Ontario.
The actions leading up to the lawsuit begin in 2011, when a borrower from the London, Ont., area took out a $400 loan. He repaid that loan nine days later, and it cost him $147 on top of the $400, Foreman said.
At the same time, the Ontario government started doling out regulatory actions against The Cash Store, laying charges and challenging the company’s business model. A new regulation was passed under the Payday Loans Act, , that made The Cash Store’s conduct very clearly offside, Foreman said.
We have the best information from those two companies regarding all of the borrowers eligible for a claim, including loan amounts, and we’ve spent the last six months organizing that for the website, so that it’s really an easy experience for the borrowers
Borrowers who took payday loans, including lines of credit, from The Cash Store and Instaloans will now be able to make a claim for a recovery of some of the fees and interest they were charged, following a decision by the Ontario Superior Court of Justice to approve a $10-million class action settlement.
There were five locations in Greater Sudbury at that time. Throughout Northern Ontario and south into Huntsville, Parry Sound, Midland and Barrie, for instance, there were as many as 26 stores, Foreman said.
On his best information, Foreman said there were 30,000 borrowers and 130,000 loans ranging from $100 to $1,500 in that timeframe.
“We believe there are 100,000 people in the class, and about one-third of them are in the North,” he said.