If well-targeted advertising is capable of blinding anyone, imagine what happens when the need is pressing. “Until 4,000 euros in less than 24 hours without the need for guarantees and without changing banks “, reads the announcement of a well-known entity that is dedicated to granting microcredits. The so-called revolving cards raise the stakes:” We advance you the money and you decide how much you pay each month“.
These types of cards are currently one of the most widespread credit tools and also one of the most dangerous. Not only for their high interest rates – between 20 and 30%– but because they are granted without any prior solvency study and their own configuration ends up perpetuating the debts. “The revolving system is a rotating system, which means that, if you have not paid this month, everything you have requested plus interest will accumulate the following month,” he explains. Ainoa Amado, lawyer of Arriaga Associates.
Currently, revolving cards They are not only offered by unknown banks or companies, but also by major retail chains without users being really aware of the bottomless pit they are getting into. “Normally, the client is allowed to pay a very small amount per month. What happens? Well, with a fee you do not even cover the interest, so everything that you have not paid accumulates and, in the end, the debt is perpetuated“.
A freelancer drowned in debt
That is precisely what happened to Mari Carmen. “And not for living a great life,” he clarifies before telling us his story. After spending a few years abroad, she separated from her husband and decided to return to Spain. “I found myself without a job, with two children and without any help from my ex, so I started to set up a business as a freelancer, but, of course, at first you can’t make a living from that, “she explains to Libre Mercado.
Little by little, the business not only took off, but began to grow. “At the end, the more you grow, the more you pay -the Mint-. You don’t earn more, that’s what I’ve realized now that I’ve retired, that I should have planted myself at a level where I didn’t have to hire more people, because in the end that was drowning me. “
In these circumstances, the revolving cards knocked on his door like a lifeline. “You didn’t even have to look for them. They called you on the phone and offered them to you: We give him a credit of I do not know how much and we send it to his account … And if you were at the top and had to pay everything, you fell. “The problem is that that desperation made him enter a wheel from which he was unable to get out : “You look for help and, in the end, you end up hanging“.
In addition to the cards from the most popular stores, Mari Carmen ended up having three revolving cards for which she paid, in total, 1,500 euros per month. He hired them back in 2003 and not even a year ago he has managed to bury his debt. “I was aware that had to withdraw 1,500 euros to pay the cards. And I was paying for everything. I could be a few days late, but I always paid. The problem is that every year he still owed the same thing. The only thing I was paying was interest, “she says desperately.
At first, he tried to reach an agreement with the companies, “but they don’t negotiate with you while you pay,” so he opted to hire the services of one of the many agencies that advertise online. He paid 4,000 euros, which were useless. “They told me to stop paying all the bills and that they would take care of everything, but after a year They called me to inform me that lThe companies had not answered and that my house was going to enter the contest she recounts with the same outrage and disbelief she must have felt that day. How was it possible? If all I wanted was to pay… I didn’t want my debt to be forgiven! “
Desperate, she began calling everywhere herself. With the big commercial chains he managed to reach an agreement. He had to take the credit institutions to court to show that the 29% interest that they came to charge him were usury: “Of one even They gave me 8,000 or so euros back and from another, more than 19,000 “, she presumes today already satisfied.
Even so, he is unable to forget the ordeal he has lived through: “You can’t imagine the stress that is. They call you all the time. In fact, now I no longer owe anything and they still keep calling me. I have to have the landline disconnected, because if not, there is no one living here“.
And that is not the worst. There was a time when bullying even went further. “One day I came from work and there was a man talking to the neighbors. You cannot imagine what I have suffered,” he explains with a trembling voice. He had to start taking sleeping pills and even admits that he considered taking his own life. “I even thought about committing suicide. I saw no way out I did not care, but the worst were my children, who left all the debts to them, because the debts do not disappear “.
Hell of a military man
The case of Juan Luis does not differ much, although his downfall was not the revolving cards, but the traditional ones microcredits. Like so many other military personnel in our country, the constant transfers and changes of house ended up taking their toll: “He had two mortgages, many expenses, three children of school age and, suddenly, you need money and you resort to what, at first, seems like quick and easy money. “However, like Mari Carmen, she soon realized that it was a bottomless pit:” You pay a lot of interest and you never finish paying the debt. “
As explained by Arriaga Asociados, this type of credit is usually more transparent, since, unlike what happens with revolving cards – where contracts usually include completely incomprehensible mathematical formulas – the interest to be paid almost always appears clearly here . The problem is that entities take advantage of the desperation of those who have to face a payment immediately and see no other way out.
“What these entities do is abuse their privileged position. They usually offer small amounts to be returned in a very short time frame with very high interest rates,” explains Ainoa Amado. The shorter the term, the higher the interests tend to be: “Right now I have on the table the case of a client who asked for 200 euros to face some bills that he had to pay now. The interests were 33 euros and I had to pay it all in 10 days. Many times we do not stop to think about it, but we are talking about a 26.257% APR“.
Juan Luis came to pay a 1,000% interest, but her microloans were much higher. “In the end, to pay one had to ask for another and the ball got bigger and bigger,” he laments. After the legal battle, he has managed to get 1,000 euros back from a microcredit, 4,000 from another and 19,000 from a third party that he had for more than a decade. “The legal issue takes a long time, but it has two advantages: not only do you get back what you have paid more, but you get to cut with them.”
98% success in court
In Arriaga Asociados they claim to have “98% of cases won” in both microcredits and revolving cards. The legal tools they have are fundamentally two: the Usury Law -that, despite dating from 1908, has been updated by the Supreme Court jurisprudence– and the legislation relating to the general contracting conditions.
As Ainoa Amado explains, the Usury Law declares void any contract that applies an interest significantly higher than the average rate without just cause: “The Bank of Spain publishes the average rates every month, which serve as the basis for knowing how the market is doing. If the revolving card rate, for example, is over 20% and the customer is being charged 26% or 27%, we would be talking about usury. ” In this way, you will only have to pay the money that you had initially requested: “Interest, expenses and commissions will be returned to you. It’s like their would have been a zero-rate loan. “
The other way to claim this type of credit product is through the general contracting conditions, since the information must be adapted to the client’s profile. “A revolving card contract, for example, is very complex for an average consumer. Even for us it is still difficult to read certain contracts, because they are not really transparent, there are complex mathematical formulas, there are times when the APR does not appear and the paragraphs are very cumbersome for an average consumer “, they warn from Arriaga. Thus, since these contracts carry a significant economic burden, could be declared null if the client is not able to understand how it works.
To pay or not to pay?
The big question that many users have is whether, while waiting to file a claim or for it to be resolved, they should or should not continue paying their loans: “I always tell the client that It is better to pay, but if you do not do it, it is not an obstacle for our claim. “
The explanation is very simple: if you keep paying and win, they will return everything that you have overpaid; if you stop paying, even Even if you win, you will always have to pay back what you have initially been loaned and, if you lose, interest will accrue and it may even be that, as in the case of Mari Carmen, her home is in danger.
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