Lenders ‘must be responsible’ under code
September 7, 2007 by admin
Filed under News, News-Loans
Under the terms of the Banking Code, lenders must ensure they are extending credit to people in a responsible way.
Adrian Lloyd, spokesperson for the Banking Code, said that lenders are committed to ensuring that people can only borrow money if they are realistically able to repay it.
“What the code actually says is: ‘We will assess whether we feel you will be able to repay the borrowing’,” he said.
“It’s something we do take seriously, ensuring that lenders under our code do dually go through a proper credit assessment and not necessarily get into difficulties.”
Mr Lloyd added that should borrowers find they are struggling with repayments, the code also includes guidance for how lenders should deal with it.
“If things do go wrong and people get into financial difficulties then our code also says quite a lot about how to handle cases of financial difficulties under the general heading that people must be treated sympathetically and positively,” he explained.
According to figures from CreditAction each adult in the UK owes an average of £28,550, including mortgages.
