Loans are Daunting, This was simple (Northern Rock)

Member Name: yorcie

Product:	Northern Rock
Date:	08/06/01 (385 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Easy to complete, Very helpful calculator, A professional service

Disadvantages: Reading through all the blurb, Paying interest, Having to revert to paperwork at some stage

It's good to get what you want, but you lose a large chunk out of your pay every month for years.

I used to be in the financial services so I am well aware of most of the pitfalls when parting with your money. I saw the error of my ways and got out while i still had my dignity in tact.

But there is no such thing as a free lunch, you don't get something for nothing. So i looked around very very carefully when i needed to buy my latest car. The money i wanted was a mere £5,000 but no matter where you look they all try to bamboosle you with scientific data. The most annoying thing is that whichever company you go to they will have been voted the best lender this side of the black stump. THEY ALL ARE, there must hundreds of polls and they all tell you what they want you to hear.

So, getting back to my loan. The previous time i went for a loan computers were still in the DOS era and the internet was for large companies. That time i trudged the streets getting brochures and then falling asleep while i read them all. This time however it was painless, in fact i didnt have to walk anywhere (well, from the computer to the kettle and back again). I thought i would try the internet to get some info on my loan. That way i wouldnt have some pimply little wretch trying to make some commission out of me while showing no interest in me at all (except that that he wanted to charge me). First of all you have to make a list of building societies banks and even supermarkets now, you can either get them from a search engine or do what i did and reach for the Sunday paper, its always full of advice on who wants your money. They invariably give you a list of the top 5 best performers and the worst (leave the worst alone). There is your first five choices. In my case Northern Rock was in the top 5. I scanned each site and much to my pleasure nearly all of them gave you a little calculator so you can work out your own time scale and your ow
n payments. It was good to mess around with it without looking a complete fool.

This really meant that i could print out one company, mess around with the next company and compare the results there and then. This was actually quite pleasurable (now im getting sick). As i went further into the murky depths of money borrowing i found the rates varied, but not just by a quarter or half percent, but by three, four or even five percent and more....It made me wonder who would be foolish enough to pay 5% more than they needed to.

So, my comparisons clearly demonstrated that Northern Rock was the cheapest for the time span i wanted. Not only was it the cheapest it was less expensive by 1 whole percent than its closest rival, that was a lot of money over three years.

So having now chosen Northern Rock i discovered that i could apply for this loan online. This was getting better and easier by the minute. But that's where it slowed down because you can fill in some details online but they still have to send you a paper form for you to write on (the older ones will remember how to write) But in its defence the papers arrived two days later, they were filled in immediately, scanned and stored on my hard drive and then taken back to Northern Rock by Postman Pat.

It was no time at all that the man from Northern Rock said 'Yeh' and in no time at all the money was in my bank account. I suppose it could be seen as a bit frightening really, give a bit of information and the next day there's five grand in your account.

So, with all that done i was able to use my walking power to go get my car. I have to say that it really was quite painless. The repayments are the price I wanted to pay and over the term i wanted to go to. I was able to compare as many companies as i liked but no matter how far you seem to investigate the pattern shows itself fairly fast. I have now been with Northern Rock for about 7 months a
nd they dealt with the loan very professionally and very quickly. It's comforting to know that there are companies out there that are prepared to tag a little bit of helpfulness on to your loan and call it customer service.

You could do a lot worse than investigating their site, its simple but very effective. But as much as i want to recommend Northern Rock, Do look around and compare, after all, they cant be at the top all the time....can they?

I'm more than happy to be emailed if you have any questions

yorcie

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