Likely Loans Debt – Debt Advice Blog

Today I am going to write up a complete guide of my Likely Loans Debt. Likely Loans are also known by other names, most recently Finio but also Oakbrook Finance Ltd too. This writeup will look at my overall experience with Likely Loans from start to end. It is mostly a story of my debt but could be useful as a sort of review too. This is one of my debts that forms the total of all my debts as talked about on my about page.

First off, let’s take a look at some facts and figures about my Likely Loans Debt so you can see where it came from and where it is now.

• Date Loan Taken out: July 2022.
• Amount of Loan: £4000.
• Loan Term: 36 Months.
• Monthly Repayment: £145.25
• Date of Default: Not registered yet.
• Debt Management Plan Payment Amount: £41.14.
• Debt Collection Agency: ACI.
• Purpose of Loan: Debt Consolidation.

Why did I take out a loan with Likely Loans?

The purpose of this loan was to refinance some credit card debts. The interest rate from this loan was lower and would reduce what I was paying out each month by a small amount. With Likely loans being fairly well known, they didn’t set off any alarm bells! The interest rate offered to me seemed reasonable and their pay out would be within a day or two. Their typical APR though is very high so be careful of that!

How did I find out about Likely Loans?

I am signed up with Experian to monitor my credit report, offers like the one I got from Likely Loans regularly hit my inbox. One day I decided to see if I could apply and refinance the credit card debt I talked about earlier. I made an application and was approved, although this approval being subject to some final checks. The APR I was offered was much lower than their typical APR.

Confirming approval of my Loan

As I mentioned above, the loan was subject to final approval. This final approval arrived the next morning by email and text message. My loan was paid into my bank account later on that day.

How long did it take to receive the funds from Likely Loans?

Receiving my funds took a few hours from when Likely Loans informed me that the funds were sent to me. I didn’t know it at the time but this was another domino falling into place towards me heading into debt.

What happened with Likely Loans?

As explained earlier in this writeup, I used this loan to settle some credit card debts. I did settle these credit card debts but I did make a fatal mistake I suspect others have made when consolidating credit card debts. You can probably guess that I did not close down the credit cards I paid off with this loan. After a while, my spending started up again and after some time I was making an even larger payment towards my debts. This is because not only did I have this new loan, but I also needed to service these additional credit cards plus other accounts too.

What happened when I missed a payment to Likely Loans?

Having missed my payment, contact was made to me by Email, Text and Phone to chase the late payment. All perfectly reasonable. I went to the Likely Loans website to see how I could contact them and opted to use their contact form which did have a Payment Difficulties option. This area helpfully provided links to organisations who could help me with debt worries.

Setting up a repayment Plan with Likely Loans

I found it easy to set up a repayment plan with Likely Loans, I went to their website and: –

• Clicked Help and Support at the top of the page.
• Selected the struggling to pay option.
• Clicked the What should I do if I am struggling to pay option.
• Clicked the online tool option.
• Completed the form which asked for details of my income and expenditure as well as my other debts.
• Made an offer of repayment that was suitable and affordable.

I confirmed that my Priority Debts were up to date. Examples of priority debts are debts such as your rent, council tax, energy and secured loans. There are more types than what I just listed, these are just some examples. I always remember priority debts as debts where there are greater consequences of not making payment.

Further Reading: To learn more about Priority Debts, visit this article. This is written by Citizens Advice in the UK and explains what priority debts are and what you should do if you have them.

Likely checked my request and accepted the reduced repayment proposal. Reviewing these arrangements is typical and nothing to worry about. A review is there to check that you can still afford to make the payment and that your circumstances haven’t changed in the interim.

Which way did I make my reduced payments?

I already cancelled the direct debit so in order to make payments, I logged into the Likely Loans Website and made my payment manually via debit card. My concern with using Direct Debit boiled down to a lack of control. Likely could if they wanted too, take a different payment once they had given me the required notice.

Payment Review from Likely Loans

As expected after three months my situation hadn’t changed. I received an email telling me my payment arrangement review was due. My reply back was to say nothing has changed and could my reduced payments continue. We reached agreement for another three month arrangement.

If I wasn’t in debt would I recommend Likely Loans?

I would as long as you don’t get their typical interest rate. Mine was quite a bit lower than the headline rate of 50%. If it was 50% then I would run a mile.

The customer service was good and Likely Loans acted fairly when I had difficulties paying. Higher interest rates are something you should be looking out for! Being mindful of this could save you a debt headache later on. My debt would be much worse if I had a loan from Likely Loans with that high of an APR.

Reporting to the Credit Reference Agencies?

At the moment, the loan actually shows as closed and paid on my credit report. There are arrangement to pay and missed payment markers registered but no default just yet. Whether this will change I don’t know but I will update this section if it does.

Selling my Debt On

Likely loans sold the debt, in this case ACI purchased the account. They didn’t get any information about my previous arrangement and was hounding me to set up a repayment plan with them.

I received an email from ACI inviting me to sign up to their website. I also received a letter in the post from Likely Loans / Oakbrook to advise that they had sold the account.

For some reason, ACI reduced the balance by just over £500 as a gesture of goodwill although I am not sure why they did this. I guess they paid pennies on the pound to buy this debt so can afford to do so. Either way it did help reduce the size of this debt and every little helps!

Who are ACI?

ACI are a Debt Collection Agency and they opened for business in 2015. They are currently based in Blackpool and became part of Perch Group in 2018.

I update StepChange

At this point I had already been in contact with StepChange Debt Charity and set up a Debt Management Plan. They were already making payments on my behalf. I logged into the StepChange Portal, chose transfer debt and provided the details for ACI.

This is where we hit some problems. ACI advised me they were not being told anything by StepChange. Due to this, the hold ACI put in place for me expired. After a little more contact, ACI confirmed everything was in order and the account is now in an arrangement.

What happens now?

Based on my past experience of being in debt, I think the following things will happen: –

• ACI will review this account every six months to see if the payments are still manageable.
• This debt is unlikely to change hands given that ACI have purchased the account.
• My Payments will be finished in 2030.
• One thing I will look into is the affordability of this loan.

Anything else to say?

It looks like I have covered everything I wanted to say about Likely Loans and this writeup detailed the complete journey of my account with them from opening to closing. In my next post I will cover another one of my debts in the same way and keep doing this until I have written about all of my debts. After this I will move on to other things I would like to write about which I think would be helpful to someone in debt.

If you do have a debt with Likely Loans or are struggling to repay, the first thing you should do is to contact them to see if they can help. You should also consider getting independent advice from an organisation such as StepChange Debt Charity. The best way to deal with your debts is to face them head on rather than ignoring them. Reaching out to your lender or an independent organisation is a good first step towards solving the problem.

Until next time thanks for reading and good luck with your debts.

Getting Help: Visit StepChange Debt Charity if you would like to get help with your debts. StepChange Debt Charity are a non-profit organisation and the advice they offer is free.