Indiana payday loan help

Susu...have you posted this before? I seemed to have read this...anyway first thing you need to do is check with the Indiana Department of Financial Institutes. You can find out if any of these pdls are licensed in this state. I live in Indiana also.
If your loans were taken out after July 1st there are new laws specifically aimed at payday loans and internet payday loans and you will see if they are even legal...which I doubt. You can also check on this site and see the letters etc that you can use to notify these loan companies of your intentions. You do not have to do anything drastic such as bankruptcy...please read the information on this site.
Others will be along to help.

Welcome to the forum, SUSU. If these are the only real debts you are worried about and not struggling with any others such as credit cards, medical bills or any other unsecured debt, considering filing Chapter 13 bankruptcy is not worth it for $1600.

First off, how much have you paid on these loans in finance charges/rollover fees? None of the lenders you listed are licensed in Indiana. Also, I can tell you with almost 100% certainty that each of these lenders is violating the Indiana payday loan laws by charging excessive interest and permitting unlimited rollovers of the loan, which is not allowed.

Since these lenders are not licensed in Indiana and are violating Indiana's pdl laws, you are only legally obligated to repay the principal of the loan. Any finance charges you have paid so far can be applied towards the principal you borrowed.

The lenders will argue and say they only have to follow the laws of the state they are located in, but this is not true. They may threaten to have your wages garnished or other things to scare you, but that is all it is, scare tactics.

If your checking account is still being debited by all 4 of these lenders, go into a branch of your bank and talk to someone about how you would go about blocking the debits or if you could close the account and reopen a new one as you feel your banking information has been compromised over the internet. A lot of banks are sympathetic to this and will help you as long as your account is not overdrawn.

Then, you want to send a letter to each of these pdls via certified mail, return receipt requested. Advise them that you have recently been informed that they are not licensed in the state of Indiana and are in violating Indiana payday loan/small loan laws by charging an interest rate that is in excess to the rate Indiana allows and also exceeding the number of rollovers of the loan that Indiana allows. Given these fact, you are only obligated to repay the principal amount borrowed, and any finance charges that have been paid to date are considered applied towards this principal balance.

Advise them that you have advised your bank that you no longer authorize any type of electronic debit or payment withdrawal by their company, and any future attempts will be reported to your bank.

Also, some of the payday lenders try to enforce what is called a Voluntary Wage Assignment, which is basically giving them permission to garnish your wages. This is not court-ordered, and if you revoke it in writing, not allowable. If you are not sure whether or not you agreed to this with any of these lenders, just include in the letter that you are also hereby revoking any voluntary wage assignment that you may have agreed to when entering into the loan agreement with their company. Advise them that you have also notified your payroll department in writing of this revocation. (Draft up a letter to your payroll dept. that states something similar regarding revoking any voluntary wage assignments you may have agreed to, and do not authorize them.)

Work out how much you can afford to send these lenders until the principal balance of the loan is paid off, and inform them in the letter that you are going to send a payment of $_____ every (two weeks, month, etc.) until the principal amount borrowed is paid in full. Inform them that you are mailing a money order as payment to them via certified mail.

Many lenders will try to convince you that they cannot accept mailed payments via money order, that they only accept direct debits from your account, electronic checks, debit/credit card payments, or payments made by Western Union/MoneyGram. This is total BS, so ignore it. Or another option is to get a pre-paid debit card for each lender that can be reloaded with funds. Only add the amount of funds that will cover the payment to each lender. This way, they will not have access to your bank account, and if they try to withdraw more funds than you have authorized (which many of them try), it will not go through. If you choose to pay this way, advise them of it in your letter.

I thought there were NO rollovers allowed in IN?

Looks like you are correct Tweety

You will find the Payday loan laws for Indiana here (just select your state),
http://www.debtconsolidationcare.com/paydayloan/explain-pdls-laws.html

No roll overs are allowed in Indiana and they must be licensed in the State of Indiana to be legal. I have had good luck filing complaints on internet lenders with our AG office.