HOW DOES Newcastle United manager Alan Pardew motivate his players? By urging them to give 100 per cent on the field? Or perhaps even the mythical 110 per cent? Neither of those, according to the joke doing the rounds in the City; what Pardew demands from his team is a heady 4,214 per cent.
That’s the astronomic annual rate of interest charged by controversial payday loans firm Wonga, which has created a storm of protest by securing a sponsorship deal with the Premier League club that will see its name – a slang term for money – emblazoned on the players’ shirts.
Newcastle United is, of course, owned by billionaire Mike Ashley, no stranger to controversy himself. Ashley, whose personal wealth of £1.6 billion ensures he has no need for Wonga’s services himself, recently bought a package of stores from failed rival JJB Sports, which is now in administration, and has declared himself determined to see off his remaining competitor, JD Sports.
Despite having signed a two-year sponsorship deal with Virgin Money in January, Ashley ended the agreement a year early after securing new terms with publicity-hungry Wonga. The four-year Wonga deal is worth £24 million, money the loans firm clearly believes will be well spent to secure its name on the famous black and white NUFC strip.
The high-profile Wonga sponsorship has not only angered football fans in the northeast, one of the poorest regions in Britain, but is also causing concern among consumer groups and debt counsellors. There is nothing illegal about what Wonga does, which is to offer short-term loans, often used to tide people over at the end of the month, hence the term payday loans. But with interest charged at the rate of 1 per cent a day, the APR works out at a heady 4,214 per cent.
Wonga insists that the APR measure is not appropriate for its business, where the loans are granted for just a month. And it says that it is merely providing a vital service for its customers, many of whom have been turned away by traditional lending institutions.
The firm prides itself on its super-fast processing of applications, a computer-based system that enables it approve loans within 15 minutes. But there is criticism that its checks are not stringent enough and that children have manipulated its automated system to gain funds, sometimes using older friends to make the applications, only to find themselves hopelessly in debt when they fail to make the repayments.
“Legal loan-sharking” is how Wonga’s critics describe its hugely successful business, a business that last year saw profits soar almost as high as its APR, roaring ahead from £14.1 million in 2010 to £59.2 million on the back of some 2.5 million loans.
And that’s the real problem with Wonga – its business is perfectly legal and it is, as it is required to be, upfront about the rates it charges. So why shouldn’t it have its name on the Newcastle players’ backs, or indeed the stadium?
But we all know the answer to that – the sight of millionaire players for a billionaire-owned football club advertising the services of a company such as Wonga in the region that suffers Britain’s highest personal bankruptcy rate is not an edifying one.
Rather than railing at Wonga, or even Ashley, however, disgruntled Newcastle fans would do better throwing their weight behind calls for Britain to come into line with virtually every other European country by putting a cap on the amount of interest that can be charged on loans.
That would bring some relief to Wonga customers – and if the company were to flout such a cap, it would be an illegal, rather than legal, loan shark. And then something could be done about it.
THE fall in the inflation rate to a near three-year low has brought good news and bad news for Britain’s pensioners. Good news, in that the drop to 2.2 per cent last month will ease the erosion of the savings on which many pensioners rely, but bad news because it will affect the level of their state benefits next year.
Annual increases in the state pension have been set at a minimum of 2.5 per cent but can be increased in line with the September cost of living or the rise in average earnings should either be above 2.5 per cent. Although energy prices are set to push inflation back up again later this year, that will come too late to influence next year’s pensions. And the average earnings figures due today are unlikely to help, with a figure of 1.5 per cent expected.
Fiona Walsh writes for the Guardian newspaper in London
