Thirty Minutes to find bad practice....
29th April 2003

Cheque Cashers fail to follow own code of conduct

Question: How long does it take to find a cheque cashing agency breaching it's own trade association's code of practice?

Answer: Approximately 30 minutes.

In February this year the British Cheque Cashers Association (BCCA) supplemented its Code of Practice with a "Best Practice" document for payday lenders that were 'rolling over' loans and ratcheting up the cost of short term loans (see 'Cheque Cashing: Will we learn from the U.S' - 25th Feb 2003). The code requires payday lenders to at least have a maximum limit on the number of times that rollovers will be allowed.

But in just thirty minutes on 29th April, Debt on our Doorstep found two BCCA members willing to roll loans over on an "indefinite" basis. One of these was a branch of Albemarle & Bond, pawnbrokers with over 50 branches throughout the UK, and has a written policy stating that it placed a limit on the number of rollovers permitted. A spokesperson from the BCCA confirmed that he would be talking to both companies concerning their failure to conform with the code of practice in the near future. However, given that it took only 30 minutes to find two companies in breach of the code, we suggest that the BCCA may need to do much more to make its code effective.