Consumer complaint received 2024-09-12
Product: Payday loan, title loan, personal loan, or advance loan — Installment loan
Issue: Charged fees or interest you didn't expect — 
Company: Scott Fetzer Financial Group Inc. (TN)

On XXXX my wife and I agreed to purchase a XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX  with a retail price of {$3700.00} USD under an agreement to perform 6 showings to family/friends and " sell '' 2 units for a refund of half of the retail price ( {$1800.00} minus tax ) of our own XXXX unit . This was all agreed upon with the salesperson from XXXX XXXX. XXXX in XXXX. TN. The salesperson told us verbally that we could expect a total of {$4000.00} total amount to be financed ( retail price +sales tax ) and after telling her we'd like a 36 month term, she provided " rough estimate '' of payments to be XXXX XXXXmonth. We were to expect a personal check from XXXX XXXX, XXXX for the {$1800.00} to be sent to us at a later date if we met the requirements as outlined. On the day of the original sales agreement we were told no loan would " activate '' for 90 days in order to allow us time to meet the requirements for the refund before we started any payments. Because of this, neither of us found it suspicious that we were not provided any loan documents to review and/or sign.

We completed the requirements for the agreed reimbursement, and at the end of the 90 day period to perform showings/sales, my wife received notification to send the first payment which was the expected XXXX XXXXmonth ( around the first of XX/XX/2024 ) and did so. Today I received a notification ( XXXX ) from my credit card company 's credit monitoring feature that a new loan was posted on my credit which reflected a balance of {$6000.00}, monthly payments of {$120.00}, on a 48 month term. We immediately contaced the saleperson and informed her of what had happened and were told " Oh no, that doesn't sound right. Let me call ( the district manager ) and the finance team and see what I can find out for you. '' As of this complaint, there has been no further correspondance from the saleperson or her management team.

This entire ordeal raised concern so we started going through any documents we were given. While investigating we discovered my wife had been emailed an electronic copy of a loan contract through XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX that neither of us were shown on the day of the original sales agreement, nor would we have ever agreed to sign had we been shown. This contract reflected the original, agreed upon amount, plus a finance charge of {$2000.00} ( more than 50 % the retail price of the unit ) which was never disclosed to us. There was also an interest rate of 20.29 % listed which was never disclosed. This document had e-signatures of myself and my wife, but again, was never seen by either of us.

I feel like we have been the victims of a blatant violation of the Truth In Lending Act and/or XXXX XXXX, XXXX forged our electronic signatures on a loan contract in order to secure wildly unacceptable, and grossly unreasonable terms which would more than offset the costs for the promised refunds made by their sales person.

I am not certain the lender ( XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX ) is directly responsible for this, or even aware of the practice, HOWEVER their representative agent ( XXXX XXXX, XXXX ) is 100 % at fault and it reflects very poorly on UCFS if they allow this to continue unchecked and without recourse.

This predatory, and illegal, practice could potentially ruin lives and should not be allowed to continue.