Recently, some netizens broke the news on social media that they were harassed by suspected collectors pretending to be government officials due to debt problems. The netizen said that in the name of the government department, these collectors frequently contacted him and the local government department, claiming that he needed assistance in dealing with the debt problem and asked the government to help find his whereabouts. This incident has attracted the attention and discussion of the majority of netizens.
It is understood that from 2016 to 2018, the netizen frequently borrowed money on an online loan platform in Hangzhou, borrowing as many as 46 times, and the amount of each loan was 3,000 yuan. However, what is shocking is that the actual loan amount received by the netizen is only 2,650 yuan each time, and the platform deducts 350 yuan of interest and service fees in advance when issuing the loan. This means that the borrower has already borne a portion of the cost at the beginning of the loan.
What's even more unreasonable is that when the 14-day loan cycle is over, the amount that the netizen needs to repay is still 3,000 yuan, including the principal, interest and service fees. This actually means that the netizen not only needs to pay interest and service fees when borrowing, but also needs to pay these fees when repaying, forming a strange phenomenon of the so-called "double interest + double service fee".
The netizen said that he applied for a loan through the client of the online loan platform, and all the links from filling in the information, applying for a loan to issuing the loan were completed on the platform. Even the final repayment link is completed by the client who logs in to the online loan platform by himself. However, what puzzled the netizen was that since the repayment process was completed independently, how did the service fee of this online loan platform arise?
Secondly, the netizen said that after paying off the last installment of the loan, he still received a collection call from the online loan platform or a third-party collection agency entrusted by it, which caused widespread attention and discussion.
According to the netizen, he has been repaying the loan on time during the loan period, and the last installment of the loan was also repaid as scheduled. However, after the last repayment, the netizen failed to pass the review when applying for a new loan. Soon after, he received a call from the online lending platform, asking him to repay a loan he had not received.
In order to prove his innocence, the netizen proposed to obtain bank card transaction records as evidence. However, the collector said that even if the bank statement was provided, it could not prove that the netizen had paid off the loan because they received information that the netizen was overdue.
Faced with this situation, the netizen repeatedly asked the collector to provide identity information or an agreement or contract entrusted to them by the online loan platform, but was refused. What made the netizen even more puzzled was that the collector's statement on the phone changed many times, sometimes saying that it was a post-loan staff of an online loan platform, and another saying that it was an outsourced third-party collection agency.
The netizen strongly questioned this, believing that this kind of "one will change" remarks is not credible. In the phone, he asked the collector to provide basic information about the company he belonged to, and pointed out that the key to legitimacy is whether the company has the relevant qualifications. At the same time, he also said that if the collection agency is not legally qualified, then they not only need to explain the source of the personal information, but also need to prove that they have not instigated the implementation of illegal debt collection practices.
In addition, the netizen's 46 loans are also extremely problematic, because according to Article 680 of the Civil Code, usurious lending is prohibited, and the interest rate of the loan must not violate the relevant national regulations.
If there is no agreement on the payment of interest in the loan contract, it shall be deemed to have no interest.
If the loan contract is not clear on the payment of interest, and the parties cannot reach a supplementary agreement, the interest shall be determined in accordance with factors such as the local or the parties' transaction methods, trading habits, and market interest rates;
Where natural persons borrow money between themselves, it is deemed that there is no interest.
Article 29 of the "Provisions of the Supreme People's Court on Several Issues Concerning the Application of Law in the Trial of Private Lending Cases" Where the lender and the borrower have agreed on both the overdue interest rate and the liquidated damages or other expenses, the lender may choose to claim the overdue interest, liquidated damages or other expenses, or they may claim both, but the people's court will not support the portion of the total amount exceeding four times the one-year loan market prime interest rate at the time of the conclusion of the contract, and the "one-year loan market prime rate" referred to in the preceding paragraph , refers to the one-year loan market prime rate authorized by the People's Bank of China to be released monthly by the National Interbank Lending Center from August 20, 2019. Therefore, in private lending, the agreed interest must comply with the law, and the excess part is invalid.
In fact, we have said so much, but it is important to be clear that borrowing with an annual interest rate of more than 36% is often considered usury. On the mainland, usury is strictly prohibited. According to the relevant provisions of the Contract Law, the loan contract between the parties shall follow the principle of fairness and shall not harm the public interest and the legitimate rights and interests of others. Therefore, a loan contract with an annual interest rate of more than 36% is likely to be invalid because it violates the principle of fairness.
In addition, the mainland has also issued a series of special laws and regulations to crack down on illegal lending with an annual interest rate of more than 36%. For example, the Provisions on Several Issues Concerning the Application of Law in the Trial of Private Lending Cases clearly point out that if the lender requests the borrower to pay interest at the interest rate agreed in the contract, the people's court shall uphold it, except where the interest rate agreed upon by both parties exceeds four times the one-year loan market prime interest rate at the time of the conclusion of the contract. This means that even if the borrower and the borrower agree on a high interest rate in the contract, as long as the legal limit is exceeded, the agreement will not be protected by law.
At the same time, the relevant departments will also investigate and deal with illegal lending with an annual interest rate of more than 36%. According to the relevant provisions of the Criminal Law, for the purpose of illegal possession, the use of fraudulent methods to illegally raise funds or transfer loans at usury, and the amount is relatively large, will constitute the crime of illegally absorbing public deposits or the crime of usurious on-lending, and criminal responsibility will be investigated in accordance with law.
So the question is, why did the netizen still receive a call from an unidentified person after paying off the loan, and whether the 46 loans he applied for were legitimate?
A netizen who is engaged in the accounting industry recalculated his debt to the netizen, according to the loan he applied for each time was 3,000 yuan, but the actual amount received was 2,650 yuan, with a difference of 350 yuan, and the 350 yuan charged by this online loan platform is reasonable?
According to the accountant's calculation, the 46 loans applied for by the netizen are 3,000 yuan each time, and we will temporarily follow the clear provisions in the "Provisions of the Supreme People's Court on Several Issues Concerning the Application of Law in the Trial of Private Lending Cases". The provisions point out that if the annual interest rate agreed between the lender and the borrower exceeds four times the one-year loan prime interest rate at the time of the conclusion of the contract, the interest on the excess part will not be protected by law. In the mainland, this upper limit is usually regarded as an annual interest rate of 36%, and the interest of a month of loan borrowing in 3000 months is 89 yuan according to 36%, but this netizen's borrowing cycle is 14 days, then we will deduct the general fee on the basis of 89 yuan, that is, 89 * 2 = 44.5, to put it bluntly, it is 44.5 yuan, and this 44.5 yuan is calculated according to the upper limit of the annual interest rate of 36%, so this amount includes all expenses.
The online loan platform's pre-deducted 350 yuan in the issuance of loans is very unreasonable, and the annual interest rate is as high as 280%, which is several times the upper limit of the annual interest rate of 36%, and according to mainland laws, the annual interest rate exceeds 36% The above debts are invalid debts, then, the comprehensive interest rate of the netizen's 46 loans is about 2047 yuan, and in fact, the online loan platform actually deducts the service fee of the netizen (the 350 yuan deducted in advance minus 44.5 yuan is equal to 305.5 yuan, plus the 350 yuan repaid is a total of 655.5 yuan, because the loan is the same loan, and there will be no same interest, so we do not need to deduct interest on the 350 yuan we repay when calculating).
According to the netizen's actual deduction of 655.5 yuan * 46 times when applying for a loan, it is equal to 30,153 yuan, plus if the online loan platform cannot prove that the netizen's last loan was actually issued to the account, then add 3,000 yuan, then the current amount is 33,153 yuan, as of now, the netizen has been taking out these loans for more than five years, and we will first follow the loan market prime interest rate of 3.45%X4=13.8% on March 20, 2024 However, if the netizen's actual debt has been more than five years, then the LPR for more than five years is calculated according to the latest quotation rate of 3.95%X4=15.8%.
Because the 33,153 yuan is a legally clear invalid debt, and it is also an actual debt that exists, and the duration of its existence is more than five years, if we calculate it according to the annual interest rate of 15.8 per year, the actual debt of the netizen has been converted into the actual debt owed by the online loan platform to the netizen, and the invalid debt should be returned according to 36,020.73 yuan per year, and it has been more than five years, and the interest that needs to be repaid each year is 2,867.73 yuan X5=14,338.65 yuan, plus the actual principal of 33,153 yuan, then the netizen now needs to return the debt of this online loan platform is 47,491.65 yuan.
We still calculate according to the interest rate prescribed by law, if we calculate according to the annual interest rate of 36% interest rate red line, then this online loan platform now needs to return more than 67,000 yuan of debt, which is also very ridiculous, if we follow the interest rate of this online loan platform 280% If you calculate it left and right, the annual interest rate is as high as 67,827.54 yuan, plus five years, that is 339,137.7 yuan, and this also adds the principal of 33,153 yuan, which is 372,290.7 yuan.
However, we can't do this, because we are legal citizens, and our appeal is to ask this online loan platform to return our invalid debts, that is, more than 47,000 yuan, and even if we don't owe them money, their outsourced collection agencies are still illegally collecting invalid debts, and also use illegal means to infringe on us, but when we are illegally infringed by these self-proclaimed online loan platforms, we also have to face the negative impact of some banks in some regions uploading our invalid debt information to our personal credit report, which will cause us a second harm.
In particular, the netizen reported that recently, some illegal collectors pretended to be government officials and contacted the relevant local governments by dialing false numbers, and netizens who claimed to have debts lost contact and asked the local government to assist in collection. This kind of fraudulent use of the government's name not only violates the privacy of individuals, but also seriously interferes with the normal administrative order.
It is reported that when these collectors who pretended to be government officials contacted the local government, once the government asked them to provide their identity information, they immediately hung up the phone and disappeared without a trace. This kind of behavior is obviously fraudulent in nature, which not only makes the government feel helpless, but also makes netizens who owe money panic and uneasy.
After an in-depth investigation by the local economic investigation department, it was found that the phone numbers used by these illegal collectors were actually generated through a virtual dialing software. The software automatically generates numeric numbers that are not available to the operator for any information. The advent of this technology makes it easy for criminals to hide their true identity and commit fraud.
The credit collection market is an important means for financial institutions to protect their own rights and interests and ensure the safety of credit funds. However, some illegal collection agencies and individuals have used technical means to impersonate government personnel to carry out illegal collections, seriously undermining market order and social stability. This kind of behavior not only harms the legitimate rights and interests of consumers, but also affects the healthy development of the financial industry.
In response to this problem, the government and all sectors of society should work together to strengthen supervision and crackdown. On the one hand, the government should improve the relevant laws and regulations, clarify the legal boundaries of collection activities, and increase the penalties for illegal collection agencies and individuals.
What do you think about this?