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Pay Day Regulation

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Current pay day lending regulation Reports such as those cited above prove that the current regulation of pay day lending in Australia is not sufficient to protect consumers from the risks of pay day lending. The main legislation in place to protect Australian consumers is The National Consumer Credit Protection Act, 2009 (NCCP). In 2011 Bill Shorten, who was the Federal Minister for Financial Services and Superannuation, introduced a Consumer Credit and Corporations Amendment (Enhancements) in which he proposed needed amendments to the NCCP. The amendments were aimed to protect consumers from the industry by putting caps on the interest rates and the other additional fees pay day lenders charge. The bill also proposed prohibiting multiple …show more content…

Low interest loans from non traditional credit providers do exist, many of these are provided by non-for-profit groups. “Six hundred and fifty services nationwide offer no- or low- interest loans through Good Shepherd Microfinance.” (Stephen Long, 2015) Microfinance is a term for financial services targeted to people on low incomes, welfare or otherwise financially excluded and can not obtain traditional loans. They provide a service that is basically the same as pay day loans but without the high interest or short term time frames. The Australian government has a duty to protect vulnerable people from pay day lending, they need to finance programs of Microfinance like Good Shepard who “have reached more than 170,000 people previously excluded from mainstream banking access to loans and savings, with repayment rates consistently above 95%.” (Good Shepard, 2015) If the government can effectively implement government-run alternative credit providers, and step in and finance the already successful programs like Good Shepard, as well as making these alternative services known and accessible to consumers this will greatly reduce the harm pay day lending can cause. An education campaign to accompany the new alternate credit options would also help consumers better understand how pay day loans work and therefore make them aware of the risks they are taking when using the high interest services. However, most of the 1 million Australians using pay day loans are fully aware of how exploitative the industry is, but it is still the most rational or only option they have to obtain money when they are desperate. This is not only deeply concerning because it indicates how many people in our society are financially insecure, but is a clear sign that stricter regulation is not going to solve the problem unless consumers have alternate

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