The Story Of Pontianak Students: In Order To Pay Off Rp. 3 Million From Legal Loans, They Are Even Involved In Debt Of Rp. 19 Million From Illegal Loans

AKARTA - Losima Putra, a student from Pontianak, West Kalimantan, is dizzy because he is trapped in an illegal online loan (pinjol) of up to Rp. 19 million in the last three months.

Initially he borrowed IDR 1.2 million with a return of IDR 1.4 million from a legal online loan application to start a business. He chose an online loan because the application process was easy.

Seeing a good opportunity, he tried to increase the loan by Rp. 3 million. This is where the problem begins. There was a problem with his job so that his income stopped.

"To cover a legal online loan, I tried to find a loan in another application and it turned out that I was stuck with an illegal loan application," said Losima, Wednesday, October 27, quoted from Antara.

He said, in addition to the very unsettling collection method, the repayment period of the loan was also very short or not in accordance with the agreement.

"If the legal loan application is given 30 days to several months for the return process, but this illegal application only takes a few days to borrow, there is an immediate billing. In addition, the illegal loan provides daily late fees if I (the customer) do not pay debt," he said.

Until finally to cover the debt from the illegal loan, he borrowed online in other places until he reached 14 applications with a total loan of Rp. 19 million.

"This illegal loan, I borrowed Rp. 2.5 million, the disbursement was only Rp. 1.9 million. Then if it is past the due date, then one day the fine for being late is up to Rp. 180 thousand. They also charge rudely and threaten me to pay it immediately ," he said.

He added that due to the rough billing he became very disturbed. It's even hard to sleep because of the terror. The terror he experienced, either by telephone, social media or with harsh threats, disrupted his lecture activities.

"I hope that the police will thoroughly investigate this illegal loan application, which is troubling, because now many people have become victims," he said.

The Head of Public Relations of the West Kalimantan Regional Police Kombes (Pol) Donny Charles Go stated that his party had named two suspects from 14 employees of PT Sumber Rejeki Digital (SRD) who were secured in connection with illegal online loan collection services (pinjol) in Pontianak City.

"The two suspects, with the initials SS and Y. The two suspects act as captains in charge of supervising the Desk Collection or illegal loan collectors," he said.

Previously, the ranks of the West Kalimantan Police Ditreskrimum raided an online loan debt collection company at a house on Jalan Veteran, Benua Melayu Darat Village, South Pontianak District.

The debt collection company has been operating since December 2020. This company cooperates with 14 illegal lending companies that are not registered with the Financial Services Authority (OJK).