Lenders contemplate future in Virginia
April 23, 2009 | VAs Against Payday Loans, Virginia, customers, employees, industry, industry critics | Comments (1)From the Richmond Times Dispatch:
Recession and additional regulation have shrunk the ranks of cash parlors in Virginia more than 19 percent since December. There now are 630 payday-lending outlets — down from 786, according to the State Corporation Commission.
Leading the exodus is Check ‘n Go of Mason, Ohio, which is closing its 68 Virginia outlets. It is among five instant lenders surrendering their payday licenses to Virginia regulators.
“We’re fighting to survive,” said W. Allen Jones, founder and chairman of another major lender, Check Into Cash of Cleveland, Tenn., the nation’s largest privately owned payday lender.
“People will not overspend; they’re not confident in their jobs.”
But rather than leave the state, Check Into Cash is closing 19 of 64 stores — idling about 60 workers — and shifting to pricier, lightly regulated open-ended loans. This could buttress annual profits that, when the company was offering only payday loans, had fallen to about $10,000 per store from $15,000 in 2004.
Legislators always think payday lenders are bluffing when they say jobs will be lost, stores will close if onerous restrictions are imposed. Well, what do they think now?
Comments»
Payday lenders ar NOT bluffing when they say that jobs will be lost! I am one of the employees of a payday lending store that has LOST a job! And, sadly enough, there will be many, many more to do so.
Thanks to all of these changes I have lost my job & am now getting unemployment benefits!
The laws should go back to the way they were in the first place so that these people who have lost their jobs can go back to work & stop getting unemployment benefits! This would also help the economy.
With the economic crisis that we are having right now, these payday lending stores will come in handy for the “responsible” people who use these stores to help them in times of need.