ilmoro
Member of DD Central
'Wondering which of the bu***rs to blame, and watching for pigs on the wing.' - Pink Floyd
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Post by ilmoro on Aug 18, 2021 10:48:58 GMT
Well now that most of you have sodded off. For the brave & the stupid that remain ie me the platform seems to be back working the way it did before it got popular. Mostly fully invested, PF paying out (and emails being sent to that effect after 20 months of silence), PF & bonus interest credited each month. Even my small withdrawals arriving in a few days, got double bubble on the last one as they managed to pay it out twice (if it doesnt get reclaimed I suppose I will have to contact CS and see if they respond to get it back) Now that said I havent tried exiting any of my investments, the website is still a study in user unfriendliness and disfunctionality (including possible regulatory breaches when it comes to PF disclaimers) and I wouldnt put any new money in or recommend it but currently on paper my top performing platform. So there you go, the grudging balanced perspective offered to the debate. Carry on with the slaughter. As the only half positive response, have you tried calculating how much money you should have made according to the published % and then compared that to the amount you account actually goes up by? For me, I should have earned 12% but for a few months was actually earning around 4-6% and the amount even dropped on a couple of occasions.
After a year of asking I've never had a full statement and the numbers don't add up. I'd mention the lying CEO and completely unreasobable Ts&Cs where they stop paying you interest but don't give you your money but I've said enough about that b4
Coming back to this - not in detail as there isnt sufficient info as you say but the rough numbers seems right. I can verify the sum on loan equals the original investment plus paid interest and the bonus numbers. One investment has returned roughly 9% against a quoted 11.5% but when you factor in prolonged periods of pooling it wont be far out. I believe the reason that figures drop is that they include accrued interest and when a loan is bought by the PF any unpaid accrued interest comes out of the numbers and then doesnt get included until paid out as bonus. So currently anything from July & Aug is unaccounted for.
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optimist
Member of DD Central
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Post by optimist on Sept 13, 2021 17:48:05 GMT
As the only half positive response, have you tried calculating how much money you should have made according to the published % and then compared that to the amount you account actually goes up by? For me, I should have earned 12% but for a few months was actually earning around 4-6% and the amount even dropped on a couple of occasions.
After a year of asking I've never had a full statement and the numbers don't add up. I'd mention the lying CEO and completely unreasobable Ts&Cs where they stop paying you interest but don't give you your money but I've said enough about that b4
Coming back to this - not in detail as there isnt sufficient info as you say but the rough numbers seems right. I can verify the sum on loan equals the original investment plus paid interest and the bonus numbers. One investment has returned roughly 9% against a quoted 11.5% but when you factor in prolonged periods of pooling it wont be far out. I believe the reason that figures drop is that they include accrued interest and when a loan is bought by the PF any unpaid accrued interest comes out of the numbers and then doesnt get included until paid out as bonus. So currently anything from July & Aug is unaccounted for. At the time I originally flagged this, the late payments was sitting at zero which is not credible. One cannot run a payday loan company and have every single borrower pay on time for all loans. I assume they just didn't bother to display the actual values
The event history page at the time always showed an accrued amount for the previous day which was around 5% of today's amount - IE it always showed an impossibly large payment on the day in question. It noted next to it "live data including interest from live loans with successful repayments" which is clear and unambiguous. Unfortunately it is also untrue. To illustrate, the following day, the amount shown for the day in quesion would be around 5% of the value previously shown. The data was clearly wrong or the explanation was wrong or both.
Assuming the actual payments are often late, that the displayed daily data is projected but the "investment Balance" on the Account summary page is the actual recieved amount might make sense of some things. The two values "lent out" plus "Pooled" which added together should come to the investment balance, did not add up to this value (simple addition of two numbers - incorrect mutter mutter mutter).
Who knows, 90% of data shown appears to be demonstrably wrong - not sure about the rest but good luck
Oh, and the lowest interest rate of any I had significant investment in.
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Post by Badly Drawn Stickman on Sept 18, 2021 20:31:22 GMT
The big lesson for me from this platform is to keep 'decent accurate records' and don't get tempted by long term unspecified lending . I will never like them they just totally refuse to respond to emails and it got ridiculously messy,
However despite my unhappiness I have had an 'active investment' running for a longish period which was basically the profit I had made at that point reinvested into one 'think of a name'
I am fairly sure all other funds have now escaped (possibly with some profit - one day when I have the will and time I need to reconcile bank transaction to confirm - I am working on that basis anyway.
It now seems to be slowly approaching the point where all funds will be either available or in short term loans (recent events), occasional small sums become available as uninvested and get withdrawn. In cricket terms I have stopped losing wickets and am slowly in singles and extras chasing down the total needed for victory. Test (very testing) match investing I guess.
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nyneil
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Post by nyneil on Feb 28, 2022 20:04:22 GMT
Does anyone still use FO? Are they still problematic?
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Post by Badly Drawn Stickman on Feb 28, 2022 20:23:53 GMT
Does anyone still use FO? Are they still problematic? I am still 'with' them as mentioned in the post above yours. There is a very (very, very given most of the long term loans started in 2019) slow ending of the long term loans the funds from which get allocated to short term loans relatively quickly. There is no specific end date given for the long term loans but I would guess this time next year they may all have been repaid. At that point I can start an exit strategy. They simply do not respond to communication. I think it would be a brave/foolish person who started investing now.
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ilmoro
Member of DD Central
'Wondering which of the bu***rs to blame, and watching for pigs on the wing.' - Pink Floyd
Posts: 11,344
Likes: 11,565
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Post by ilmoro on Feb 28, 2022 20:35:47 GMT
Does anyone still use FO? Are they still problematic? Yes, still using them. Just left my small investment to run No issues with deploying funds at the moment. Havent tried to withdraw investments so cant comment on that but withdrawing funds to bank seems to be OK for the minimal sums I am taking out Payment of bonus interest is erratic but does get paid eventually. PF still working but dont seem to get any email notifications. CS non existent Website is still poor, and user unfriendly and regulatory compliance is questionable. Bizarrely possibly my best performing platform on paper, XIRR running at 11%+ but whether Ill ever realise it TBD ... dont touch the medium term business loans. Probably wouldnt recommend it
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ilmoro
Member of DD Central
'Wondering which of the bu***rs to blame, and watching for pigs on the wing.' - Pink Floyd
Posts: 11,344
Likes: 11,565
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Post by ilmoro on Feb 28, 2022 20:54:48 GMT
Does anyone still use FO? Are they still problematic? I am still 'with' them as mentioned in the post above yours. There is a very (very, very given most of the long term loans started in 2019) slow ending of the long term loans the funds from which get allocated to short term loans relatively quickly. There is no specific end date given for the long term loans but I would guess this time next year they may all have been repaid. At that point I can start an exit strategy. They simply do not respond to communication. I think it would be a brave/foolish person who started investing now. No sign of any of my long term loans repaying ... term is in the loan documentation, about 5 years generally ... most of mine are about halfway.
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nyneil
Member of DD Central
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Post by nyneil on Mar 1, 2022 11:56:12 GMT
Thanks for all your replies. I was in Welendus when it first started, but bailed out when things started to go wrong. I'll continue to watch from afar.
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Post by crodgers on Apr 24, 2022 10:14:54 GMT
I’ve just invested in FundOurselves. I had an in-depth read of all the comments in relation to it to here, and have a few questions. Would I be correct in saying FO has changed its lending model, merely as I deposited £5K, and it was 100% loaned out in 3 days via 19 loans, with the longest loan expiring in August 22. I assume they no longer issue “long term” loans? My next question is, has a ‘lender’ ever had a loan that defaulted were the ‘principle’ was not then paid by the Provision Fund? Finally, when does interest action get paid - is it monthly when the borrower makes their 1st payment?
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ilmoro
Member of DD Central
'Wondering which of the bu***rs to blame, and watching for pigs on the wing.' - Pink Floyd
Posts: 11,344
Likes: 11,565
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Post by ilmoro on Apr 24, 2022 11:13:05 GMT
I’ve just invested in FundOurselves. I had an in-depth read of all the comments in relation to it to here, and have a few questions. Would I be correct in saying FO has changed its lending model, merely as I deposited £5K, and it was 100% loaned out in 3 days via 19 loans, with the longest loan expiring in August 22. I assume they no longer issue “long term” loans? My next question is, has a ‘lender’ ever had a loan that defaulted were the ‘principle’ was not then paid by the Provision Fund? Finally, when does interest action get paid - is it monthly when the borrower makes their 1st payment? I dont know if they are still issuing 'longer' term loans but if your lending settings are set to short term only (max of a year) then funds wont be allocated to them even if they are. I am not aware of any loans that havent been covered by the PF Interest payment is odd. Interest shows as paid (now FO have fixed the display) when the borrower pays it (usually monthly) but its isnt actually paid until the loan ends. ie taxable income. Even then it isnt paid as a sum you can remove, it is added to the sums invested on the platform. The only way to remove funds is to withdraw the full investment. Any uninvested cash within the investment will be paid out and the rest as loans are sold/repay. FO are not always quick at returning cash. While you are withdrawing you will not earn any interest. As you will see from the posts, extracting funds has not proved easy. You can sell individual loans up to a cutoff point, but I have no idea what that cutoff is. The exception is any interest payable on loans purchased by the PF, that will be credited to the unallocated funds and can be withdrawn on request. Payment of PF interest (assuming that that is still done for new lenders, its a marketing thing not guaranteed) is random. It used to be monthly, but is now arbitrary. Ive just received Jan, Feb & Mar payments in mid April. Edit most figures displayed on the platform relating to interest are largely incomprehensible
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Greenwood2
Member of DD Central
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Post by Greenwood2 on Apr 24, 2022 16:53:59 GMT
I’ve just invested in FundOurselves. I had an in-depth read of all the comments in relation to it to here, and have a few questions. Would I be correct in saying FO has changed its lending model, merely as I deposited £5K, and it was 100% loaned out in 3 days via 19 loans, with the longest loan expiring in August 22. I assume they no longer issue “long term” loans? My next question is, has a ‘lender’ ever had a loan that defaulted were the ‘principle’ was not then paid by the Provision Fund? Finally, when does interest action get paid - is it monthly when the borrower makes their 1st payment? I find it a bit surprising you were encouraged to invest having read the threads on here. I have been half tempted a few times but it just doesn't seem worth the risk (or the irritation most lenders seem to feel).
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Post by Badly Drawn Stickman on Apr 25, 2022 18:28:25 GMT
I’ve just invested in FundOurselves. I had an in-depth read of all the comments in relation to it to here, and have a few questions. Would I be correct in saying FO has changed its lending model, merely as I deposited £5K, and it was 100% loaned out in 3 days via 19 loans, with the longest loan expiring in August 22. I assume they no longer issue “long term” loans? My next question is, has a ‘lender’ ever had a loan that defaulted were the ‘principle’ was not then paid by the Provision Fund? Finally, when does interest action get paid - is it monthly when the borrower makes their 1st payment? I find it a bit surprising you were encouraged to invest having read the threads on here. I have been half tempted a few times but it just doesn't seem worth the risk (or the irritation most lenders seem to feel). Clearly we have managed to make it sound attractive in some strange way. I have just spent ten minutes trying to find the bit to transfer out unassigned funds, given I have mysteriously accrued some. I am sure it is in a different place every time it happens.
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ilmoro
Member of DD Central
'Wondering which of the bu***rs to blame, and watching for pigs on the wing.' - Pink Floyd
Posts: 11,344
Likes: 11,565
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Post by ilmoro on Apr 25, 2022 23:11:55 GMT
I find it a bit surprising you were encouraged to invest having read the threads on here. I have been half tempted a few times but it just doesn't seem worth the risk (or the irritation most lenders seem to feel). Clearly we have managed to make it sound attractive in some strange way. I have just spent ten minutes trying to find the bit to transfer out unassigned funds, given I have mysteriously accrued some. I am sure it is in a different place every time it happens. Yep, I played that game yesterday ... good news is the money is already in my account. Bad news theyve only paid it once this time, unlike less time when I got double bubble though they did claim it back from the next few payments at least it was an incentive for them to make the payments (Yes, I did notify them but as their CS is just a black hole that emits nothing, the response was predictable)
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optimist
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Post by optimist on Jul 19, 2022 19:40:44 GMT
Liars, Thieves and Crooks A liar might be typified as someone, perhaps a CEO who says they have a £100M investor but doesn't. Who says they will pay your money back but doesn't. Who makes various promises and breaks them
A thief is someone who takes your money but won't return it, who does so under false pretenses, such as you being able to get your money back when in fact the terms and conditions state that they can stop repayment if they feel like it (if there is some unexpected financial situation) and not pay you until all repayments have been made which may never happen - ridiculous and should be illegal Ts&Cs if the FCA pulled their finger out.
A crook is someone who enters into the above knowingly, makes a business out of it and profits.
There are many examples here of investors who have had their money taken, invested and when asked for, the company refuses to return it and stops paying interest. Most of them will not complain so you will not see the pain and suffering caused
Liars, thieves and crooks (as a general discussion regarding how you catagorise stuff of course)
FO - AVOID like these B*****ds like the plague IMO - of course nothing to do with the general discussion above regarding nomenclature
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benaj
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Post by benaj on Jul 19, 2022 19:58:21 GMT
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