A powerful letter to the editor in Ohio’s Newark Advocate from a manager at a Cashland store.

Mike Sussman appreciates the fact the payday loans are completely undertstandable as opposed the his incomprehensible credit card statement.       His column in the Newark Advocate concludes with this:

I have spent most of my life in the lending and lending subsidiary business. It has been my experience that banks will make ridiculous loans to questionable business entities at low rates of interest while denying the small borrower anything other than high interest short-term credit card loans. Please see Skybus and Enron.

Payday lending, while expensive, is the last line of defense for the financially overburdened low credit score consumer. Taking this option away will only increase the amount of hardship in a state already overwhelmed by foreclosure. Consumers, unlike Bear Stearns, will have nowhere to turn for immediate financing.

Melissa Lutz, owner of Fast Check Cash Advance in Newark, Ohio, is worried about her customers if the Ohio House legislation becomes law: 

 We have a lot of customers that are going to have nowhere to go to get short-term loans,” she said. “If our legislature will look at other states that have (capped lending rates) … the people in that state are worse afterwards than they are before.”

The article also has comments from Ms. Lutz’s employee who is worried about her job and health benefits.  Are Ohio state senators listening?