American Finance (OR) LEI GEN GROUP, Monroeville, PA
Queja 321521 Detalles

I filled out applications online for personal loans; through different companies trying to find a loan that would be enough to buy a vehicle for my family; but not too much where the interest would be too much to pay back. The next day I received several calls that I didn't answer assuming it was denials. I decided to pick up a call from one that came from a NY number. The man said he was with American Finance. I barely could understand them, however; the representative told me I was approved for a loan up to $10,000 and asked how much I would like to borrow. I replied $4000.00. That representative gave me a number to call and told me to call right then to speak the manager; a man supposedly named James Anderson, who was the loan officer. The man told me that a loan of $4000.00 would be paid back in monthly payments of $294.00 & asked if that were ok, I agreed. He then told me that due to my low credit score I had to pay the first payment of $294.00 up front to prove I could make the payments and that I would receive the $294.00 back along with the $4000.00 loan; that they just wanted proof I could make the payment. I even told him that doing that made me nervous and he said, "Ma'am we are giving you a loan without any collateral. We already have your account information; if we just wanted your money we could have taken it already." So i believed him. He told me to go to Walgreens, a CVC pharmacy or somewhere similar to buy a vanilla Visa gift card & deposit the $294 on the card & call him back with the card information. I did what he instructed and he told me the money would be deposited into my account within 30 minutes. By the time I had returned home, it had been 40-45 minutes so I called him back. He immediately answered the phone addressing me by my first name, informing me that they tried to deposit the money into my account 3 times & realized I had a red flag on my SS # & would have to resolve the debt before they could give me the loan.. James Anderson told me that they would pay $1500 of my debt if I could pay $310.00 & that I would then receive $5800.00. I proceeded to tell him I only had that amount left & that it was my rent money & I was scared to spend it in case the same thing happened. He promised after that the loan would go through in 5 minutes. So I went & bought another vanilla visa gift card, deposited $310.00 & called him with the information. I waited about 30-50 minutes got no deposit & called him back. He transferred me to "his manager" supposedly named, Alex Barkar, who told me the total debt the credit bureau wanted from me was $600.00 & I had to pay another $300.00. I got angry & told him I didn't have it & never mind, I did not want the loan & refund my money back to me. My husband then took the phone & started to scream at him & told him to stay on the line while he was refunding the money. The man said he would refund the money & it would take 2 hours & hung up the phone. I looked online at the account history of the 2 gift cards & saw that both transactions were posted to the account of LEI GEN GROUP located in Monroeville, PA and both transactions were still pending. I immediately called Visa and spoke with a Customer Service Representative and asked him to stop payment on both transactions. They told me I could only dispute the transactions and it would take 30-60 days to resolve it and up to 90 days to actually get my money back if I could show it was a scam. The account history on both cards show a six digit Reference # _ _ _ _ _ _ POSPreAuthCompletion: Checking: NoAccount.. I don't know what exactly that means but I'm assuming it didn't go to the Credit Bureau like I was told. I was lucky and had my Mother-In-Law to help me with rent so my family did not end up homeless but there are many people who are not so fortunate. I don't the next step to take and what other information I need. I hope someone can help me after reading this.