Dear Mrs Macaulay,

I received a letter from a loan company saying I am in arrears with them. I do not remember taking a loan from this company, plus the address the letter went to, I moved from that address from 2016. I know I went to that loan company once to apply for a loan, and I was told I was not qualified, and that was from about 2012. I have not been back to that place, plus my telephone number and e-mail are the same, and no one contacted me until I received that letter from a church member who brought it to me at church saying my past landlady asked her to give it to me. I was so shocked.

I moved back to the country in 2016 to take care of my mother before she passed on in March 2020, when COVID hit Jamaica. I came back to Kingston in 2022 and got a job and started all over again, and now in 2024 this loan that I do not remember taking out has come to haunt me.

I am seeking your advice before I reply to this letter on what I am to say to them.

I note that you say that you do not recall obtaining a loan from the company. What you should then do is simple. You must write to the company and state clearly that you do not recall having obtained any loan from them, and that they had turned you down in 2012. You should then ask them to send you a copy of their alleged loan agreement, showing clearly the signatures thereon and the date it was purported to have been signed by you, as well as the principal sum and the percentage per annum of the interest charged by them for the whole period they claim that the loan was made for. And you must also ask for a copy of the purported application for this loan they claim is due, from which the agreement should have been prepared and then signed by you.

In addition you must ask for a full and complete statement of the purported loan account, signed by the proper officer of the company, showing the alleged capital loan sum and the rate of interest they have charged thereon. And finally, you must also ask them why the letter you received from you church member was the only communication they sent to you.

You must then give them the period of 30 days for them to send these documents to you. You have a right to ask and demand these copies from them under and pursuant to the Moneylending Act, and the right to check whether they are charging compounded interest rates.You should however offer to pay them the usual fee for copies of documents.

If they fail to provide you with these copies within the 30 days, then you can go to the parish court in your parish and make an application for an order directed to the company for an account from them to be produced and delivered to you within a fixed period of time.

It would be sensible for you if they ignore your request, to retain the services of a good commercial lawyer to act on your behalf to ensure that all advantages you can use under the Moneylending Act are used, and that the actions of loan companies which are by the Act illegal or null and void or enforceable, are brought to light and that you obtain all and any relief to which you are entitled. You would have to meet the expense of the lawyer’s fee at the inception, but in the end upon your success with the lawyer’s assistance, the company would have to pay your costs of obtaining justice, which might not cover all but some part of your expenses.

It may be proved that the company is not in law entitled to any payment from you at all, which they are purporting to claim, if the loan agreement in fact exists. Your lawyer may need to have the opinion of a handwriting expert whether the alleged agreement and and the application were in fact signed and written by you.

It is truly worth the initial expense for you to have a lawyer assist you with this matter. You have not given me enough relevant details for me to have a full understanding of your situation, so please get yourself a good lawyer to act with and for you.

I wish you all the best and hope you will ensure that when you prepare your reply, that you include all the demands I suggested, and bring yourself under the protection of the Moneylending Act.

Margarette May Macaulay is an attorney-at-law, Supreme Court mediator, notary public, and women’s and children’s rights advocate. Send questions via e-mail to allwoman@jamaicaobserver.com; or write to All Woman, 40-42 1/2 Beechwood Avenue, Kingston 5. All responses are published. Mrs Macaulay cannot provide personal responses.