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Tom - a representative rate means that the actual rate charged will depend on your credit history and it could be a lot higher. In fact chances are the target market for this will be those with a poor credit history and have difficulty with mainstream lenders and I bet the 'representative rate' far from represents what would actually be charged.
This is appalling and people should not allow Christmas and the pester power of their offspring to push them into such arrangements. Indeed no-one really should fund their Christmas spending from borrowing anyway. Many do so of course and it becomes part of a spiral that is hard to escape.
Roger where such high percentages are charged and I have seen APRs of over 4,500% (yes, four thousand five hundred not four point five...) it is usually aimed at short term borrowing where someone might borrow some money, a small amount and pay it back with a fee on top a few days or a short period later.
It sounds OK for someone to borrow say, £100 and to pay back £120 a week later - but work it out as if the 'fee' represented a 20% interest for that week and assume it was not paid back, then over 52 weeks it would compound up to become £1,310,462 - over £1m. Work it out yourself, I have not bothered with an APR calculation....
Here is a question that can illustrate the impact of compound interest...
Take £1 - day 1, double it to £2, day 2 double it again to £4, day 3 to £8 - work out how many (rather how few) days like that it would take to get to £1,000,000.....