I know that I have a legal leg to stand on. I am sure that you are aware of the many companies across the United States that offer "payday advances". I am sure you are also aware of how they suck people in and get them caught in a trap that they cannot get out of. I am currently in such a trap.
No I do not want money from you if that is what you are thinking. I did get myself into this mess and somehow I will get myself out but I will need some sort of advice or help or whatever.
I got a cash advance on the 28th of june of this year. I had dealt with the company once before (two weeks before as a matter of fact) and there were no issues. They had issued me this "advance" in the form of a check. I had deposited that first check with no issues so this time when they gave me a check there was no problem, or so I thought.
The day before the 4th of July I went out to run some errands. My gas light came on so I decided to stop and get some gas before going to get a fast food dinner. My atm/check card would not go through at the pump. I went inside and the guy at the register thought that it might be due to an issue with the pump as that kind of thing had occured before. It would not go through there either.
Luckily the man knew me and accepted a 5 dollar check from me. When I got home I called my banks automated line and was shocked to discover that I was 210$ and some change overdrawn to my account. When I checked my deductions it showed a debit for 260$ to my account.
I got myself put through to an operator and got the explanation from them that the check that had been issued to me by that cash advance company had come back as an NSF. As this was after the payday places business hours I was unable to contact them. The lady with the bank informed me that since it had overdrawn my account by more than 150$ that they would represent the check. Wrong.
Thursday night my paycheck was electronically received through a direct deposit. This out me 100$ in the clear (until they took out massive bank fees that is). Needless to say two checks bounced that night followed by two others on friday during the day when the bank was playing catch up for the holiday. This amounted to 128$ in bank fees.
I was able to get one reversed because a charge came through for an item that I had cancelled. I contacted the payday place as soon as they opened and informed them of what had happened. I got documentation (including a fax copy of the NSF check fron and back) showing what was charged to my account as of that moment. (Only two NSF charges had shown up at that time, I had not found out about the others until later)
I was informed that I needed to bring the actual NSF check in to get that money otherwise the owner of said company would only refund me the 5$ charge at that time. After much yelling and threatening of lawsuits they agreed to accept the fascimmille copy and it was agreed that I would hand the NSF check over to them.
When I arrived at this company the manager was all smiles and very friendly toward me and wanting very much to resolve the situation. She explained that checks had bounced before and that the bank had always called them before refusing to pay them so that they would not come back as an NSF.
She stated that she was going to be calling the bank so that a stop payment would be placed on the check so that my bank would not represent it electronically since they were going to give me cash. I thought that that was fine. I handed her my documentation so that she could fax it to the owner.
He received his copies and I took my originals back. He then refused to give me beyond the five dollars as he said the faxed copy was not "clear" enough. He stated that we would have to wait until I received the actual check in the mail from my bank before he would do anything about it. I was livid!
My bank informed me that it was out in the mail that day so I would receive it friday or monday. That did not help me out that day. I took the five dollars anyway (probably a mistake) and left the store. I had managed to store up 250$ of my own that was supposed to be sent to my car payment place and I still had a positive showing of 20$ in my account.
I had two payday loans that I had to pay off that day. I took what I had and borrowed the rest and paid them both off. But I also had to reborrow both loans so that I had cash in my account to cover checks thatw ere still out and now had no funds to cover them. I was able to buy some groceries and deposit 147$ back into my account.
I thought that I had everything covered but I was wrong again. Another overdraft fee had come through that made one check that I had written on sunday bounce. I called again on Monday to see what the company was going to do (I had not spoken to the owner YET) and was informed that his decision stood firm. At this point I pre=tty much thought screw it.
I placed a stop payment on my check that they were still holding. I was recluse in the fact that I did not inform the payday advance company of this but I did not want to deal with thema t this point any more. I figured they would not be stupid enough to deposit my check qwhen I had not actually received the money for the payday advance. Boy was I ever wrong.
The monday or tuesday following the date that my "loan" was due someone from the business called and stated that they wold be depositing my checkj as I had not some in to pay off my advance. I was flabbergasted by this. Unfortunately I was unable to contact them as I got off of work and got home AFTER they had closed.
Convienient huh? When I got hime from work friday my babysitter informed me that they had called again. This time I knew that they had received my check back with the stop payment (which was another 18$ fee I had to incur) and they wanted to speak with me about it. I tried calling but guess what? Closed of course.
The next day aroun 1 or 2 in the afternoon I received a call from the owner. I did not know who he was at first so I did not inform him of my identiy as he called like he was some "friend" and wanted to speak with me. We have had problems with telemarketing calls lately so I asked where he was froma nd he informed me he was from the business that I had had problems with.
I told him that I was not in but I would be glad to take a message. He said to inform "sheri" (that is me by the way) that if I did not call him by 4 pm that day that he was taking my check to the district attorney on Monday and that he would have charges brought against me for check fraud and have me arrested and sent to prison.
This gentleman knows that I have a baby and am a single mother because when I went int o the business that day I had my baby with me as well as my nephew. I suspect that in knowing that he wanted to scare me. Well he accomplished that as I did not know at that time that I had a legal leg to stand on.
I took down the phone number but quite frankly when I attempted to call I chickened out and hung up. I did some research on the internet and found out that I had a major legal leg to stand on. On the advice of a friend that I called I made a report to the better business bureau. On monday I am going to call the District Attorney and see what I can do on that point.
I have had so may problem in the last few months with finances and things like that that my car is going to get repossessed any day now. They money that would have gone to my car was used for this. Now I am hip ddep in this crap and I have no clue what I am doing. I could not pay my babysitter that week but was able to catch up over the concurrent weeks.
The baby;s father is not much help and I am going to go after him as well. But I am only borrowing one bit of trouble at a time as that is all that I can handle. I don't know what you would recommend but any recommendation would be helpful.
By the way, I did receive the check with NSF stamped on it from My bank (which is Bank of America by the way) and I did NOT turn it over to him.
Sheri
Santa Maria, California
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