An payday lending employee defends short-term credit in a New Hampshire newspaper.

Our New Hampshire stores – and other similar lenders – closed in 2009 after the Legislature passed regulations that made it impossible to operate. We helped tens of thousands of people overcome temporary financial shortfalls. And yet, among the many customers we served in the last half-dozen years, fewer than five of them filed complaints.

That’s the theme of this well-written and balanced story in the Courier News:

Well, if you’re in the neighborhood of McLean Boulevard and Big Timber Road, you’re in luck. Right at the corner is a gigantic PLS payday loan store that will lend you a few hundred bucks pretty easily — if you don’t mind an interest rate that Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan’s office describes as “legalized loan sharking.”If PLS rejects you, a block down the street along McLean you’ll find a smaller payday loan store called Fast Cash In A Flash. Right next door to that you can trade your wedding ring for cash at Marelli’s Gold Exchange. And right across the street from those two is Elgin’s first and only pawn shop, Windy City Jewelry & Loan, where you can borrow anywhere from $50 to $63,000 by leaving that wedding ring, or maybe your high school clarinet, as collateral.

Ever heard the old saying “the squeaky wheel gets the grease?” It’s true a lot of times, as one payday lending executive notes in a Texas op-ed piece.

Many critics of our industry don’t use the product and cannot adequately speak for our customers.

A guest commentary in Missouri explains the downside to banning payday loans.

Eliminating Missouri’s short-term lending industry would do away with an estimated 10,000 jobs with $378 million in wages, $147 million in tax revenue and an estimated $20 million in annual lease payments for the more than 1,000 storefronts that would empty under the 36 percent annual percentage rate cap advocated by Ms. Whitesides.

QC Holding’s Tom Linafelt responds to negative coverage in the Columbia Missourian: 

Research shows that most borrowers understand how much their loans cost and pro-actively choose to borrow instead of their other, real-world options. Most borrowers meet their payback obligations and use the product responsibly, as a short-term solution.

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Eliminating short-term lending would hurt Missouri and its communities and devastate families who depend on jobs and important, money-saving credit options supported by the industry.

That’s what I’m talking about!

United Payday Lenders in Missouri take issue with a recent Columbia Daily Tribune column:

By ignoring facts and disregarding the tens of thousands of Missourians who borrow responsibly and use payday loans to avoid less desirable options, Hank Waters’ March 14 column did your readers a disservice.

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By imposing a 36 percent APR cap, HB 132 would absolutely eliminate the small-loan industry in Missouri, leaving consumers to bounce more checks and incur more late-payment penalty fees. Under such a cap, lenders could charge only $1.38 for a two-week loan of $100. Research shows it costs lenders $13.89 to make such a loan.

A state senator in New Hampshire wrote an op-ed this weekend explaining her effort to create a short-term lending product in the state.

… When working families find themselves in need of short-term credit to address these needs, our state laws do not allow for a safe, viable option – in many cases, forcing consumers to turn to costly and unregulated products.

A letter to the editor challenges The Clarion-Ledger on its attacks on payday lending. Good read.

Can someone please explain how it is “entrapment” to offer loans to walk-in customers at rates that are posted on the wall with signs literally six-feet tall?

A columnist from Missouri makes a good point with regards to payday loan legislation.

There are people who will tell you payday loan businesses prey upon the financially weak of our society.

What those folks won’t tell you is where Missourians would turn for short-term financial help if payday loan businesses did not exist in our state. And that’s a big problem.

If the world was perfect, we’d all be good with money. We’d all find jobs that pay a decent wage, then live within our means, pay our bills on time, put some money away for a rainy day. Too bad that’s not the way life works for every person.