Why it is not that Easier with Equity Bank’s Eazzy Loan
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Financial institutions, we are well aware, are out to milk profit from hard pressed
customers, and corporate greed is the driving force to this. Witness their well
tailored loan products targeting individuals or specific groups like chamas or even low cadres of the
unbanked populace that the hoi polloi can access. Anything attractive or well
packaged in flowery but enticing language comes at a cost which at most will
leave the applicant with a bitter taste in the mouth.
The problem is that many have no time to read the fine print in a lawyerly fashion – and even if they do, they can hardly comprehend anything and
rushes to declare they had read and understood all terms and conditions
pertaining to the agreement. What does legal jargon serve when one is seeking
to address a pressing financial need at hand?
Anyone who has taken an Eazzy loan of late will notice what I had observed.
The text confirming successful loan application does not specify the date when
payment is due; suffice to say some percentages like loan appraisal fee and
insurance amount attached to the principal amount disbursed.
As no reminder texts are sent, one is forced to go to the SIM toolkit
and access Equitel menu to check on pending loan balance. And here is where a shocker
will come. If, say, you took Sh4, 000, you will be surprised to realize the
amount charged as interest has climbed by a funny percentage. For example, in a
period of two week, the interest on principal amount will be something close to
Sh1800 meaning the bank is is making something out of you at the rate
of 1.5% on a daily basis until the loan is repaid in full.
When Kenya Commercial Bank wrongly credited someone's else line and passed
the costs to me without my knowledge and had me listed as a defaulter with
Credit Reference Bureau, Equity Bank began looking at me with different lenses and marked me as a risky factor. Sample one of their tweet messages
when they denied me credit facility when I attempted to apply a loan sometimes in 2017.
Hi, we have scored you for a credit facility but
unfortunately you are not able to access it at the moment because we received
unfavorable report from the Credit Reference Bureau on your previous borrowing.
Kindly get clearance from the Credit Reference Bureau for you to enjoy the
facility.
After a back and forth battle
lasting a full year to have KCB clear and delink my line from the stranger
where the money was wrongly credited (see here: https://paulkariuki.blogspot.com/2017/04/get-yourself-financial-stress-with-kcb.html), I attempted to apply for a loan again
with Equity Bank and its from here that I noted strange terms unlike on previous
occasions.
When I questioned the unusual discrepancies
especially at the abnormal interest rates instead of a fixed amount as interest
like in the past, or like what other institutions charges, this is their
twitter message to me complete with a link for justification.
There is an additional
fee to the loan disbursed. Which includes the insurance fee and the loan
appraisal fee which is a maximum of 5% of the loan amount. Kindly check the
Eazzy loan terms and conditions as per the below link;http://bit.ly/2lPmS7m .
The problem is,
not many are aware of, nor are they informed of such hidden costs and only
comes to know of same through bank officials spewing out corporate lingo that
more confuses than explains. If you are using a basic features phone with no
internet access, pray, how are you to access the PDF format to acquaint
yourself with their terms in fine print?
I’m of the opinion my being twice listed with
the CRB informed the Equity Bank of the need to charge exorbitant rates for
they deem me as a risky factor!
At the
end, you will have to surmise that what is good on the face value may not be
good at all.
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