SCHotline Press Releases

The Payday Lending Industry Responds

FOR IMMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: Jamie Fulmer, Media Relations, Advance America
(864) 542-7936

Today’s news conference renouncing payday lending affirms what many already knew about the groups and individuals who participated: while spending weeks in legislative hearings claiming to want reform, they have actually been seeking a ban all along. A ban would deny thousands of hard-working South Carolinians a viable choice in getting short-term loans.

South Carolina should not go the way of Georgia and North Carolina. A preliminary staff report from the Federal Reserve Banks of New York found that consumers in those states have had more bankruptcies and more financial problems as a result of bans in those states. The report concluded, “…payday credit is preferable to substitutes such as the bounced-check ‘protection’ sold by credit unions and banks or loans from pawnshops.”

Payday companies have been working to get meaningful reform for South Carolina consumers while, at the same time, protecting the individual’s right to choose. We believe that individual consumers–not government–have the right to make their own financial choices.

We welcome a healthy public debate, now that our opponents have finally admitted their real motivation.

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