Payday lenders argue against lower rates at UARB
Posted Nov 1, 2010 02:34:54 PM.
This article is more than 5 years old.
The payday loan business is being scrutinized today and tomorrow at the utility and review board.
Nova Scotia became one of the first provinces to regulate the maximum fees charged for the short-term loans, with the provision that the rates would be reviewed two years later.
Those hearings are happening now, and today some industry reps testified.
Gordon Reykdal, chairman and CEO of The Cash Store, says the 31-dollars-per-hundred rate and current market-based regulatory structure is okay.
“I think the approach that Nova Scotia is taking is, quite frankly, is the right one,” Reykdal testified. “It’s allowing for a free market approach, and for businesses to operate and give consumers good choices. There’s good, effective competition in place in the marketplace.”
Reykdal contends that the competition exists, even though two companies have the majority of the sector’s business.
“We see it every day,” he says. “We fight tooth and nail for customers with our competitors and we try to come up with a better option for consumers to help, basically, encourage them to do business with us versus a competitor.”
But every other province has lower rates, some of them much lower. Tonight, the public will address the board, and tomorrow, the consumer advocate will testify.
