Payday and Other Small Dollar Loans

Minnesotans had been charged a 220% APR on the typical storefront payday loan, but this predatory form of credit ended in 2024 when a strong interest rate cap went into effect.

Nadine Chabrier, CRL Senior Policy Counsel, teamed up with Molly Gallagher, Statewide Poverty Action Network Policy Lead, to talk to Washington state representatives about the importance of examining BNPL policy during the affordability crisis. Watch the full video to see Molly Gallagher's presentation and more.

Original research about Colorado borrowers shows expensive credit is already burying people in debt, debunking argument for legalizing even costlier credit.

Nearly 200 labor, consumer, civil rights, and community organizations joined together to express opposition to any bill, similar to last year’s H.R. 7428 (Steil), that exempts earned wage payday loans from the Truth in Lending Act (TILA). Doing so would endorse a form of loan that makes workers pay to be paid and would facilitate new evasions by payday lenders...

A panel of the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit today held that Colorado can protect its residents from out-of-state loans from state-chartered banks that carry interest rates above what is permitted under Colorado law. Predatory rent-a-bank lenders charging rates up to 199% APR or higher have taken advantage of federal laws that allow banks to charge...

Payday loan app companies try to evade state credit laws by promoting a legal fiction: they claim that these loans are not loans. As state regulators and attorneys general investigate and challenge industry violations of credit law, these lenders have lobbied state legislatures for exemptions from those laws. This state law chart serves as a shorthand guide to state regulation...

Payday loan apps draw borrowers into a pattern of repeated borrowing and a succession of fees that pull from already-stretched paychecks, creating demand for the next loan.

Our new report shows that people who take out these loans experience steep costs as well as increasing financial stress due to increased use over time.

CRL responded to the New York Department of Financial Services Request for Information Regarding Buy Now Pay Later, which requested comments from industry and interested parties on the “Buy-Now-Pay-Later Act" (L.2025, c. 58, Part Y, New York Banking Law Article 14-B). This law represents an essential step towards better protecting New York consumers from financial harm. Specifically, the Act provides...

Payday loan apps issue small, short-term loans that are typically repaid on the consumer’s next payday either directly from a bank account or as a payroll deduction. 1 Lenders market these loans as a means for workers to make ends meet between paychecks. In reality, workers who are already living paycheck-to-paycheck may find themselves pulled into a cycle of reborrowing...