The Australian Securities and Investments Commissions (ASIC) has launched legal action against Make it Mine Finance for violating consumer credit laws, including responsible lending duties.
The corporate regulator wants the company, which lets people buy appliances, white goods, televisions or computers by paying in instalments over 12 months, to be imposed with financial penalties.
In a civil action, ASIC alleged to the Federal Court of Australia in Melbourne the company did not gather financial data from customers and also failed to examine whether the contracts were appropriate.
ASIC also accused the company of not adhering to credit licencing laws.
ASIC wants the company to admit it breached its responsible lending duties and carried out credit activities without the required licence.
The company faces a maximum penalty of $1.7 million for each responsible lending law breach.
Make it Mine has voluntarily begun proceedings before the court, and confessed it did not include interest rate charges in the contract, nor did it include the cash price (or market value) of the goods through the hire-purchase arrangement, which is different from the total contract price of the goods.
"Credit providers must provide customers with all the necessary information to enable them to make an informed choice about entering into what are often costly contracts," ASIC deputy chairman Peter Kell said.
"This is especially important when it comes to financially vulnerable people."
