Usury Complaints Fall Off

The Financial Supervisory Service said Friday the number of complaints filed against loan sharks fell again in June, but less sharply than in May.

Consumers made 446 complaints about exorbitant interest rates or strong-arm loan collection tactics, the agency said. There were over 800 complaints in April and 540 in May.

An official at the agency said cautiously, "We believe that the policy measures introduced so far, which are designed to help encourage persons with smaller or unsecured loans, have been somewhat effective."

The financial supervisory agency said the average rate of interest being complained about was also falling. The average interest rate that borrowers complained about to the agency dropped from 260 percent annually in April to 215 percent in June.

The agency also said that fewer of the reported cases appear to be genuine violations of the law. It said the agency took 12 percent of the cases to the police or the prosecution for investigation, down from 37 percent in April and 17 percent in May.

The agency set up a hotline in early April to accept complaints and offer counseling to users of private money lenders. It has asked the police to investigate 450 cases out of the 1,820 cases that it received in the three months since the hotline was opened.

by Huh Kwi-shik