We tried to take out a personal loan to start a business. We submitted applications online and Riverside Lenders called us back with loan details and the amount we were approved for and then emailed us all the loan documents and requirements to process the loan.
After carefully reading thru everything (the loan documents state that it is a legal binding contract and is governed by US Federal Law), we submitted our paperwork. Part of the terms were that because of our poor credit history, we needed to make the first 3 monthly payments up front to secure the loan. Our first payment would then be due 3 months after the loan was issued.
We had options to send funds in several different ways but chose to wire the money via MoneyGram because we were in a hurry to get our loan processed. We called them to get information on where to wire the money to and they gave us the name Adam Steinhauer of Vancouver, B.C., Canada. They told us they would call when they got the money. They never called. We had to call them back and they told us that their finance department did receive the money and that our loan would be direct deposited into our account within 3 hours.
3 hours came and went and no money was ever deposited. And conveniently no one was available to take our phone calls when we called to ask what the hold up was.
Needless to say they have $1100 of my money, my SSN, my checking account info, and my DL number.
I finally got a call back from them the next day regarding my account and they made up some story about someone ran off with $100k and that is why the money wasn't deposited. But then after that the finance manager did "random" credit checks again and they had the nerve to tell me that if I sent them another 2 months payments in advance, the money would be in my account in 30 minutes.
I told them I was not sending anymore money and that I wanted a refund. They told me that it would take 3-4 weeks for the cancellation process and for them to send me a check as a refund... Yea, so not holding my breath.
But when I asked them questions about their legitimacy, they fumbled with answers and eventually hung up on me. I got the whole conversation on the recorder on my phone along with all the paperwork they sent me.
Their address does not exist. You can not do a reverse phone search because it doesn't come up. They don't have a website listed on their paperwork anywhere. If you are applying for a loan and the lender asks for any form of money up front for any reason, it is not a legit company. It is a scam!
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