Since the advent of money-lending apps, borrowing money especially when you have a small issue that needs a quick fix has been made easier.
You no longer need to keep pestering friends to lend you quick cash during small emergencies which they may not have anyway.
What you only need to do is to download a reliable money-lending app and install it into your smartphone and then you can proceed and borrow the amount that you require.
However, there is a disconnect here and things may not be all that rosy as you might be led to think when it comes to usage of these apps.
In Thika for instance, some people especially the youths who are very dependent on these money-lending apps have ended up losing their money to some fake money-lending apps.
"Last weekend I wanted Sh2,000 to fix something that was very urgent and in my pocket I only had Sh500. So, I called a friend to lend me the remaining amount but he had none. Instead, he referred me to a particular app that required me to pay a registration fee of Sh300 before I could borrow the money I wanted," says Michael Chege from Thika's Kiganjo Estate.
He adds: "I deposited the Sh300 and paid through a pay bill number provided in the app before proceeding to borrow the Sh2,000 after which I was told that my loan was being reviewed. As we talk today, my loan is still under review. Attempts to call the provided number in the app hasn't yielded any fruits because it is always off."
Chege's story can be echoed by many other people around the estate and beyond. But as he and others like him continue to wait for their loans to be reviewed which may never happen, it is only good to be wary of the many fake money-lending apps that have flooded the market and how to identify them.
Here are 5 common traits of fake mobile money-lending apps as explained by Samuel Mutiso, a Thika-based IT expert.
Mutiso, however, notes that some of these traits could still be shared by some genuine apps "though they should not exceed two in a single genuine app".
1. Ask for a registration fee
In your borrowing expeditions, if you happen to bump on an app that is asking you to pay some registration fee beforehand, think twice! You may end up losing eight trying to reach nine. Many genuine apps will lend you first and deduct such fees from the borrowed amount.
2. Easy application procedure
Many fake money-lending apps will not bother you with a lengthy procedure of borrowing because they do not care about your creditworthiness. Their concern is how they can squeeze the little that you have as in Chege's case.
3. Non-operational contacts or listed physical address
Operators of fake apps will provide contacts that they are sure you will never reach them on after they have milked you dry again as in Chege's case. They will also have a fake or no physical address.
4. They operate like pyramid schemes
Most of them will insist that you refer them to other potential borrowers in order to gain points that will enable you to secure the first loan. This will most of the time be hogwash as the intention will be to bring more victims on the hangman's noose while you get little or nothing.
5. They use and dump
Once they have used you to their satisfaction they will simply dump you to the gutters by ensuring that you can no longer be able to log into the app using the logging information that you have always used. How they do it, you may have to seek technical advice elsewhere.
#hivisasaoriginal