I took out a payday loan for $300 in November. Due to health problems I was unable to remain working and was going to have trouble paying the loan back. I emailed and phoned Paragon payday loan service to make arrangements with them but NO ONE would ever return my calls or emails. My account was "turned over" to a collection company calling themselves Westbury Ventures and a woman by the name of Chelsea Keitel was the supervisor (very unprofessional one at that) who was handling my case. Ms Keitel had emailed me saying they had taken over my defaulted loan and I owed $480 which included any extra charges. She and I agreed that I would money gram/wire them $200 on the 28th of February unless my husbands pay didn't make into the bank by 7 pm as we have direct deposit and sometimes it's after midnight when ACH deposits are processed. I told Ms. Keitel this and was honest with her every step of this process. We exchanged many emails, hers were ugly at times, and on March 1 I emailed her and said if she was still willing to make a settlement with me on the account then I had the $200 and could go wire it right then. She responded with "I need it today". After I wired the money I emailed her the controll number etc. I also asked her for the payoff settlement offer. At first she said $275 and I said I only owed $480 to begin with, so she's only giving me a $5 discount? She sent a very nasty email back saying she would offer me $175 settlement because she didn't want to prolong talking with me. I was shocked. I told her I could wire that on the 15th of March and SHE AGREED. I have all our correspondence. Today March 2nd I went to look at my bank account and Westbury Ventures had fraudulently debited my account $250. I went to my bank, they said they couldn't help me because by them taking over the account from Paragon in essence they had access to my account. So the bank called Ms. Keitel directly and I told her what they had done was not only unauthorized but not even the amount agreed upon. She became verbally hostile stating that she doesn't have control over what the accounting dept. Does AND added that when I took the original loan out, I basically signed a contract saying if I defaulted they could take whatever amounts out they wished. Come on people, I went home read my contract and NO WHERE does it state anything like this. I called her supervisor by the name of Ron and I thought he and I were making positive progress and he even agreed that I was holding up my end and he needed to put me on hold for a few minutes so he could "look at my account", I was on hold for over an hour when my cell phone died. When I went home to call, no one was there and it was still early in the day there. I have every intention of having my lawyer deal with this company unless they wire or deposit back the money they stole.By the way, Paragon Payday Loan IS Westbury Ventures so they basically screw people over from every angle. Now it's time for them to feel the pain.
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