How to know if a loan is reliable - Anti-scam guide
Quick loans have great advantages: they are fast, comfortable and, in most cases, safe. In fact, in recent years the number of people who turn to this type of financing to deal with their lack of liquidity has grown enormously . However, as with any other type of product, there are fraudulent companies. Therefore, it is important to know how to avoid scams when applying for a quick loan.
Unforeseen expenses usually come when they are least opportune, so sometimes it is inevitable to resort to financing methods to deal with them. To solve these problems, there are many serious companies that sell fast loans. These companies are safe and comply with all legal requirements to offer financing.
However, taking advantage of the desperation of people in need of urgent money, other companies with a dubious reputation are trying to take advantage by offering services that are not secure.
Of course, with any type of loan, including fast loans online, it is essential to have all the documentation regarding financing in writing. In addition, it is important that we do not request money from those companies that do not offer us all the security that they should. Thus, we can avoid much of the deceptions.
Without a doubt, the best way to avoid falling into the traps of these companies is to be well informed and act with a cool head. In this article, we will talk about how to identify these fraudulent companies to prevent them from scamming us, and what steps we can take if we have already been victims of a scam.
What should we check to know if the lender is reliable?
In order to apply for loans online safely, it is important to take into account certain details that help us distinguish a bad company from another legal and honest one. Next, let's see what are the points to check to avoid a scam and recognize trusted lenders.
It is important to note that, if after having carried out these checks, we realize that the lender is not trustworthy or does not convince us, it is best not to request the money. It is better to wait a little longer when looking for a reliable credit company than to risk being scammed.
The first thing to observe, in addition to the entity's website or platform, is how it communicates with us. It may seem something really absurd to you, but a professional who sends a statement to his clients or potential clients and who, in it, makes a series of important spelling mistakes, is quite suspicious.
But there is much more. Writing is important, however, there are other somewhat more complex factors that we must also consider when deciding who to turn to for a loan.
AEMIP seal
The AEMIP is the Spanish Association of Microloans , and checking that the company from which we are going to apply for the loan is registered in this association is a good way to eliminate many doubts. If our future lender is part of the AEMIP, we can rest easy knowing that it is a safe and reliable entity that complies with the law.
If the lender is registered with this association, a stamp will appear on its website indicating this. And, although not all insurance companies are registered in the association, this seal can give us peace of mind.
Protocol "https"
For a web page to have adequate security to enter our data, it must have the "https" protocol .
We should not confuse it with the "http", which any website has. That "s" makes the difference and will tell us if a site is safe or if we should be suspicious and not provide our data.
Let us always remember that serious lenders, who care about the security of their clients and whose information is encrypted, always comply with this security protocol.
Security certificate
In addition to the "https" protocol, we must look at the security certificate of the website. It is called an SSL ( Secure Socket Layer ) certificate and the way to identify it is to see if a padlock appears next to the URL. This padlock indicates that it is a secure website and also guarantees the reliability and authenticity of the website we are entering.
That a website has the HTTPS protocol and the SSL certificate is a sign that the data we give to the lender will not be visible by third parties. That is, the information provided will be confidential.
Opinions of other users
Although, generally, we only post service opinions when we have had a bad experience, reviewing what other users have said about a company before applying for a loan can help us discern if it is a good lender.
We will always find negative comments from any business, but if we notice that a large percentage of opinions speak of scam or fraud, we must raise our alarms. Perhaps it is time to look for another company that offers us more guarantees to request the money.
We can find opinions of other users in forums, on social networks or on websites specialized in business comments. If we do not find opinions and we have enough time, we can make an inquiry in a specialized forum.
Money in advance
Never prepay any amount of money to a lending company. The entities that offer loans legally know that when their clients ask for money it is because they need it, not because they have excess.
When we deal with a trustworthy company, it will make all the relevant information regarding the loan available to us before we sign the contract: interest, commissions, terms ... in this way, we can know in advance if it is convenient for us to sign that loan. But, never trust a company that asks us to make a payment in advance, since, almost certainly, it will be a scam.
Lists of defaulters
If we are in a delinquent file, we must pay special attention to companies that could be fraudulent. There are many reliable entities that offer loans with Credit Checker to people who are in a delinquency file. But these companies only offer us financing, they do not promise to get us off the delinquent list.
There are only three ways to disappear from Credit Checker : paying the debt, proving that it is a mistake or waiting for it to prescribe. Therefore, if a company offers us to remove us from the delinquent file and, above all, asks us for money in advance for that purpose before giving us the financing, let us be suspicious.
In the vast majority of cases they are tricks to dupe people who are desperate to get out of delinquency files. They take advantage of the fact that these people find it more difficult to get financing through other means to scam them.
Phishing or scam
The phishing technique is a fairly common technique on the internet. Basically, thanks to this type of attack, the hacker in question produces a page that is exactly the same or very similar to the page in which we are interested. In this way, when we are going to request the credit, we can access one of these imitation pages and the problem arises when we indicate our data within it.
If we receive an email that, supposedly, comes from a bank or lender and that offers us financing in exchange for us to enter our account information: be careful.
There are fraudulent companies that are dedicated to phishing . Or, what is the same, to illegally collect people's bank details and then use them in their favor. Keep in mind that banks do not usually send emails of this type.
And, above all, if they include attached documents that they want us to download or request that we respond with our access data to online banking, it is a scam in 100% of cases.
People on social media
If a stranger contacts us through a social network offering us a loan, caution. We do not accept loans from unknown persons, which are generally fake accounts used by scammers. No serious financing company will talk to us on Facebook or WhatsApp to offer us their loans.
Therefore, we must be very careful with these messages, which also tend to be very badly written and, usually, translated from another language automatically. In short, we do not accept loans from unknown people.
When in doubt, ask
If we have doubts about the reliability of an online loan company , a good way to obtain the security we need is to contact a consumer association, such as the OCU or FACUA . These associations will give us the information they have about this entity and we will be able to know if it is a serious lender or a fraud.
What can we do if we are victims of fraud?
As we have said, the best way to avoid being scammed is to be properly informed and know how to identify companies with a dubious reputation. But what if we have already been the victims of a scam? In that case, we will need to take some steps to report the wrongdoing and, if possible, get our money back. Next, let's see some steps we can take if we have already been scammed by a fraudulent fast credit company.
Check the bank account
It is important not to provide our bank account to a company that does not meet the requirements that we mentioned in the previous point. However, if we suspect that we have been the victims of a scam, the first thing we should do is check our bank account . In this way, we can find out if we have received any charges that we have not authorized and if, indeed, they have stolen from us.
If there was a charge that we did not authorize, we can continue with the next steps, to make a formal claim and try to get our money back as soon as possible.
Change all your passwords and check your data
When information theft has occurred, all of our accounts are in jeopardy. Really, it is difficult to know how far the theft of information has been able to go and that is why we should change all the passwords of all the accesses that we have on our computer.
In this way, if we operate in banking through the internet, it is possible that our account is compromised, so it is recommended to change the password of the page, as well as update all those where we have entered our bank account, no matter how small. Whatever the payment, you would be surprised by the damage these people are capable of causing with so little information
Collect as much information as possible
In order for a third party to analyze what has happened to us, it is necessary to collect all the necessary information to facilitate the relevant help. With this information, we mean to be quite clear about the page where we have operated, the place where we have seen the ad, the emails we have received or conversations through social networks , in short, the more information we can contribute to the case, the more facilities We will have to recover our money and of course, the process will be much faster.
Bearing this in mind, if you carry out any operation, from here we recommend that you do not delete any type of message or email until the entire process has been completed and, therefore, you have verified for yourself that it is not about a scam. Otherwise, having all this information, as we have said, will be especially useful.
Report to the police
In the same way that we would do if we were robbed when we are walking down the street, when the theft occurs through the Internet we must also go to the police. Reporting the scam we have suffered at the police station will be the first step in taking legal action against the fraudulent company that has stolen from us.
Go to Facua
Facua is a non-profit association that is dedicated to defending the rights of consumers. Therefore, if we suffer a scam by a supposed fast credit company, it is important that we go to it. The association will attend to the claim and will be in charge of publicly denouncing the abuse that has been committed to alert other consumers.
Go to the OCU
The OCU (Organization of Consumers and Users) is in charge of defending consumer rights so that we have a more transparent and fair consumer society. In addition to offering information about the products, the OCU offers advice and legal services in the event that we have been the victims of a deception.
Report to the OSI and the GDT
OSI is the Internet User Safety Office . In addition to offering guides to enjoy a safer Internet, if we are scammed, the OSI is a good place to report to the web or the company that has let us down.
The GDT is the Telematic Crimes Group of the Civil Guard . This division has been created to protect users from potential website fraud. We can install your plugin and, when we are on a misleading website, use it to immediately notify the Civil Guard of the scam.
Check if you can claim
As far as the collection of abusive interest is concerned, the justice is positioned on the consumer's side. And it is that in March 2020 a ruling of the Supreme Court , agreed with a customer of a revolving card that proved to be a victim of disproportionate interests.
Therefore, if we are victims of an abusive interest rate on the part of the credit institution that issued our card, we have the opportunity to claim their refund and get our money back.
If you are interested in knowing more about how to claim the return of abusive interests , here we link you to our Blog where we collect all the information you need.
Update everyone
Finally, it is important to notify friends and family about the scam you have suffered . This is more important than it seems and it is that, with the theft of data, the mail is usually accessed and through it, the accounts of your closest people are accessed.
For this reason, it is possible that the hacker has sent an email from your account to all your contacts, with the aim of being able to attract new users for his scam or that he directly uses that data to later meet new victims. By alerting your closest circle, you will prevent this from happening again and therefore prevent the problem from spreading.
As we have seen, although there are lenders companies with guarantees and that are completely safe, we can also find frauds and scams in relation to fast loans on the Internet . But, if we follow these tips and pay close attention to the points that we have mentioned, we can avoid scams with fast online credits , and get the money we need without risking being scammed.
