Arcadia Financial, TranSouth Outrageous Interest Rates Crooked Accounting Proceedures Lombard Illinois

I TO WAS FINANCED WITH ARCADIA. JUST FOR THE RECORD I WAS AN ASSISTANT MANAGER FOR TRANSOUTH SO I KNOW THE RULES!!! I WENT TO MAKE MY CAR PAYMENT OVER THE PHONE THIS MORNING AND WAS TOLD THAT INSTEAD OF MY REGULAR PAYMENT OF 405.00 I WAS DUE THE BALANCE OF $2989.40.

I ASKED WHAT WAS SHE TALKING ABOUT BECAUSE WHEN I MADE MY LAST MONTHS PAYMENT NO ONE GAVE ME ANY WARNING OF THIS. SHE PROCEEDED TO TELL ME THAT WHERE I HAD RECEIVED AN EXTENSION IT WAS DUE IN A BALLOON PAYMENT NOW.

WITH THE FINANCIAL COMPANYS THAT I HAVE WORKED FOR WHEN YOU RECEIVED AN EXTENSION THE INTEREST WAS PAID THEN BECAUSE YOUR WERE TOLD YOU HAD TO PAY IT (HOWELSE WOULD YOU KNOW) OR THE INTEREST AND PRINCIPAL WAS PUT ON THE END OF THE LOAN.

WHAT I MEAN BY THIS EX: YOUR CONTRACT EXPIRES FEB 2005 BUT WHEN YOU RECEIVE FOR EXAMPLE A 60 DAY EXTENSION YOUR CONTRACT WOULD THEN EXPIRE APRIL 2005. IT IS THE COMPANYS RESPONSIBLITY TO KEEP YOU INFORMED.

ALSO WHEN I PAID MY LAST MONTHS PAYMENT WHY WAN'T I TOLD I WOULD BE DUE THE ENTIRE BALANCE. WHEN I CALLED THEM THE AUTOMATED MACHINE STATES THAT I WAS ONLY DUE 350.00 WHICH IS LESS THAN MY ACTUAL PAYMENT. NOT JUST FINISHED YET!!

IT GETS BETTER. I HAD A DUE DATE CHANGE TO THE 15TH OF THE MONTH BECAUSE I HAD CHANGED JOBS AND THIS BETTER FIT MY NEW PAY DAY.

ARCADIA DECIDED TO CHANGE MY DUE ON ME WITHOUT MY CONSENT AND MY PERFECT CREDIT NOW SHOWS ME 30 DAYS DELINQUENT.

I DID RECEIVE A STATEMENT THAT SHOWED THE CHANGE I WHEN I MADE MY LAST PAYMENT I ASKED ABOUT WHY IT HAD CHANGED.

THE EMPLOYEE WHO TOOK MY PAYMENT TOLD ME IT HADN'T CHANGED THAT IT WAS AN ERROR AND I WAS STILL DUE ON THE 15TH. NOW, JUST WHAT DO YOU DO.

YOUR BUSINESS IS WITH THESE COMPANYS AND ALL YOU HAVE TO GO ON IS WHAT THEY TELL YOU. IT IS A RIP OFF AND IT IS LEGALLY WRONG. YOU CHANGE THINGS ON A PERSONS CONTRACT WITHOUT THEIR CONSENT AND A SIGNATURE.

I'M SURE I WILL BE CONTACTING A LAWYER. IT'S LIKE I STATED PREVIOUSLY. I'M STILL IN THE FINANCE BUSINESS AND IT'S A SHAME WHEN I SEE HOW SOME PEOPLE PAY THERE BILLS SEVERLY PAST DUE AND THEN PEOPLE LIKE ME STRUGGLE TO MAKE SURE EVERYTHING IS PAID IN THE MONTH IT IS DUE AND THEY ARE TAKEN FOR GRANTED.

SOMEONE NEEDS TO DO SOMETHING ABOUT THIS COMPANY. I COULD PROBABLY TELL YOU SOME MORE GOOD STORIES BECAUSE I ACTUALLY WORKED FOR THESE ASSHOLES.

My husband got a loan with Arcaidia Transouth about 5 years ago. The dealer told me that my credit was better but he had alonger time at his job then than I did so I could not get a loan. The truck and the loan were in my husbands name alone.

I was not in any way shape or form or signature involved with the loan. We found out that someone pushed this loan through using my social security number but my husbands name since my credit was better. WE HAD NO KNOWLEDGE OF THIS AND NO permission was ever given for my social security number to be used. We demanded it be removed,3 different persons promised to but never have.

After 29 years on the job my husband is now out of work, and since he has no income, we've offered the truck go back voluntarily. Arcaidia Rep Chris today informs my husband that since MY social security number is on HIS loan when they repo the truck it will ruin MY credit. Now I have to get my attorney to sue Aarcaidia for damages when this hits my credit because at that point it will have caused "harm" to me as a person not connected to this loan from the start.

Whoever they let illegally use my ss# to get this loan should be fired. My husband called & spoke with their corporate office and even THEY agreed it was illegal. I do have all my loan papers from day one. I am also a banker and know that I cannot enter a non interested parties ss# in the use of a loan in some one elses name it would be fraud. How they did this is a mystery.

Hello all,

I just wantd to coment on Mary's response. Mary first off I realize in your job you deal with a lot of pricks just trying not to pay teir bills. I had a lot of bad credit from being stupid at 18. when I was 25 I purchased a 1999 toyota corolla the dealer of course finance thrugh not other than transouth.

The same day I took the car home I went and set up my military allotment. I went to the ocal branch an paid the firt payment since I knewmy allotment would take a little time. after three years of these payments being paid throgh allotment all of a sudden my payments were not making it to transouth. Iwent to my inance office got proof payment was made on the 1 of the mont as always.

I conntacted transouth faxed them the proof and was told that didnt matter that I neded to reliqush the auto becouse i was financily irresponsible. went to the legal office where the jag had listened to yet another call I made to them were I got the same story.

The Jag then interuppted and got it all straightened out for me however t is still reportig negatively on my credit report transouth refus to change that I have filed complaits with all three agencies to have it corrected that way. I was still stiffed with abot $200 in late fees.

The AG can only offer advise and since I am now overseas the lawyers I call wont touch my case until I return stateside. To finally make a long story short this is not your averae fair company their only priority is getting as much money from you as possible until you get the car title if you ever do

mary you stated that compounding interest daily is not allowed well we also had a lone with acardia fin. I can tell you that we were told when i called about why our balance was never going dwn.. The customer service rep. explained to me that we are charged interest daily on the unpaid portion of our balance then a simple interest rate every month of 18.5 percent. I hve tried so hard to find out if this is legal and if its legal to hve paid in 31000.00 and 21 thousand of that in interest we paid on this car for 6 and 1/2yrs and still owed right at 16 thousand no we were no always on time we also had some extentions but i can tell u our payments were 483.86 for 6 1/2 yrs i got so frustrated with this company i would 2 day priority my payment they would call and say we didn't receive it hmm well according the postoffice they signed for it at 6 am the day before..this company is totally wierd and i feel unethical...

I walked the talk, I was a individule that went from outside collector to the position of regional v.president. I have proof repos were sold to friends, the balances charged off and recorded against the customer. I went to the so called ethics department and reported the violation. It got back to the parties what I did and a large cover up occured. I was cut from group manager to branch manager forced to work daily in a branch over 90 miles from my home. The auditor that came in told another party he was there to load up against me so I could be fired. North Carolina is a right to work state and employees have very little if any chance to prove wrong doing. 34 years service and 15 months away from 55 and cut out of one very large cash payout. I feel I was screwed out of at least $150,000.

It is unfortunate that from a lack of understanding we don't even know where to shift the blame. Are we to blame because you have heard the old saying "ignorant is bliss" however it can cost us thousands of dollars. In our financial "life" ignorant is not bliss.

If a payment is extended on the contract, THE ONLY thing that changes is the maturity date, that is it, period. You resume your payments the following month (if only one month extension were given). During that time period, yes interest is still accruing the same as it would if you missed no payments at all. The problem is this: When you begin making your payments again they subtract the interest first then apply the balance if any to the principal. (It is ALWAYS principal at the term of the contract, not intrest)

Contracts do tell you the terms and interest, the other you are talking about is math pure and simple. You must undertsnad math more so than the contract to that extent.

This is the simplest way for anyone to understand their contract.

First: Always make sure it is a simple interest contract. I think rule of the 78's or auto actuarial is very unfair.

Second: If you are sub-prime (meaning you have bad credit, are building credit, just out of bankruptcy, whatever the case may be, you will be paying a very high interest rate. Although this seems unfair, remember there is greater risk to the investor on his money, so he/she charges for the risk they may not get it all back, by that persons credit record.

Third: This is how you figure your loan and by the way you will know if you get ripped off on any additional interest. (Of course most people aren't going to take the time to do this, but I do and I have corrected some banks in the process on my loans.

Take your interest rate on the contract and divide by 365 (days in the year).
Example: 18.50% / 365 = .0506849 this is your daily accrual for the full term of this contract. so write it at the top of your ledger card.
Then take your princiapal amount:
Example: 16,500.00 x .0506849% = $ 8.363 per day.
O.K. Now if your contract was 16,500.00 @ 18.5% for 5 years then your payment would be 423.49. When you sign a contract the interest begins THAT DAY so if you have 45 days until your first payment and you make it exactly on time your interest for those 45 days is $376.33, subtract that from your payment amount of 423.49 and your principal was reduced by 47.16. Not much but it is computed that if all payments are made ON TIME during the course of the contract then it will pay off in time. Now an extension comes in to play. Using the same scenario (pretend we get one at the beginning of the contract and extended the payment an additional 30 days) at this particular time that would be a total of 627.22 in interest. Your payment of 423.49 will all go to interest, no principal reduction, it will take 3 payments to get back on track.

Don't use extensions if you don't have to, but do increase the payment you would normally make by another 1/2, if you are able to.
This isn't "anything goes" this is math people, not special rules of any particular finance company or bank.

It is called the cost of doing business and if we don't like that then we should pay CASH and we won't have to worry about the charges.

I am just saying don't blame a finance company because you were in a hardship again which is what has you where you are at these interest rates. AGAIN "NO CONTRACT" can be changed by anyone once signed, wouldn't hold up in a court of law.

If you think you are right then sue them if you can find an attorney, because in this instance Arcadia/ Transouth did NOT cheat the customer, the customer cheated themselves.

I suggest to people to make their own extension by taking your normal payment divide by 12 and pay that much xtra each month. Have it applied to payments, (it is also reducing the principal) and hey at Christmas skip a payment to go shopping, you built it in yourself.

Contracts often don't go into exactly what happens if the borrower gets behind on the payments. Technically this is a "default" and the company can repo the vehicle, or if they don't do that, start making up their own rules about how much must be paid.

If they agree to let you keep the vehicle and "defer" the missed payment, get a written schedule of how much and when you must pay to pay off the loan under these new circumstances. Even if the company were totally honest (no hidden "penalties"), deferring a payment all the way to the end of the loan is going to cost a lot in extra interest. At a high APR, it is possible to get into a case of "negative amortization," where the loan will never be paid off. Try to make up the missed payment as soon as possible, by paying extra per month or sending in an extra payment. Paying more than required whenever possible is a good idea with any loan, particularly if it has a high APR.

First if this is a simple interest loan then the entire story is based on the lack of understanding by the consumer. Simple interest loans do not continue to draw interest over 4 years on extended payments. That is compounding and illegal.

Without knowing the facts, one can only assume (based on knowledge of lending procedures)this is the facts:
#1. The consumer purchased a vehicle, sat at a dealership, reviewed (I hope) their contract. No financial company can change a contract once it is signed so the consumer knew the contract was for 72 payments or 6 years.( Except extensions & due date changes, the customer must sign achknowdledging this change.)

#2 The consumer knew the interest rate at the time they signed the contract. At this time they have the option to walk away from the deal.

#3 When extensions are given on an account, there was an interest rate on the contract and interest on any contract from banks to credit cards are based on the UNPAID PRINCIPAL BALANCE DAILY. Just because you get an extension does not mean the interest ceases. Those folks LOANED money and interest is their charge for loaning it to you!

#4 On any simple interest contract all monies are applied to interest first then to the principal, therefore it did not grow over 4 years to that ridiculous rate. Again interest is paid first so this consumer was looking at the principal, not interest that was left owing.

One may assume besides a few extensions this particular loan had some payments made over 30 days past due. You must make your payments in 30 day increments (72 payments MONTHLY, 30 days is a month) or interest eats you up. That is not the fiance companies problem, rather it would be the consumer failing to make timely payments. I also recognize that if a company offered a settlement then the account was in a charge-off status. Banks and finance companies do not offer that until that point in time and unless negoitiated this reports on the credit. Sub-prime contracts generally have a higher interest rate due to the greater potential of loss. After all, most are rebuilding credit from poor pay history to bankruptcies.

I do not know Arcadia Transouth but as a person involved in this line of work, I hear it all the time from folks that, for one reason or another, have hardships, this causes them to run late, but they want to place blame elsewhere. They don't understand the contract they signed and they paid to their disadvantage.

Thank You