Instalment loans stand out more so than anything by the high volume of competing brands. There are collectively now around 40 loan options available to UK residents in each sub-niche. The boom in supply ramped up significantly in early 2015 when price capping pushed many payday firms on to this side. We’d personally assign instalment lenders as any company that offers an online loan between the period of 2 and 11 months. The most popular micro-niches for instalments are 3 month loans and 6 month loans. There is often a heavy cross-over with firms offering each of these options. We’ll however be comparing each niches individually, starting with the smaller option here today.

The history of 3 month loan products is tied to QuickQuid (now closed) who had offered a 3rd monthly pay option for a long time. WizzCash appears to have been one of the first specialised firms on this period. They launched in 2012. Historically, payday lenders would just offer rollover extensions. Rollovers do have a bad rep and the FCA has enforced a ruling that limits the number of rollovers to just 2. Quantity-wise, there are more brands offering 3 months, but this niche isn’t quite as competitive, since lenders like Lending Stream and Sunny compete for 6. QuickQuid’s site had the most visibility in this sector (replaced by CashFloat), although Satsuma is considered as the largest instalment specialised provider.

About: Niche

One of the major problems with payday products is that any money borrowed + interest will need to be repaid fully on the next pay date. This could be a sizeable debt of several hundred pounds and so this can be tricky to pay off over such a short period, especially if the borrower is taking out other loans or racking up a large credit card debt. It is understandable that some people do run into issues and end up missing payments and in some cases losing the account to debt collectors. With a 3 month loan you are at least eradicating that requirement to pay a lump sum in one go.

It’s not only the case that the balance is spread out, but you’ll also be paying less interest since the rate is taken from a reducing balance. Given the choice of course, if a lender does offer a wider range of terms then it may make sense to spread the repayments out even further for greater affordability. Do remember that early settlements are widely available that you should be able to do quickly via your account login. If you were to borrow £300 over 90 days then in general the total charge would typically float around £150. Good competitive value would be seen by those charging closer to £100 (or less) and there are several companies offering such deals.

Notes…

Alexa.com: Comparison listings are sorted by global traffic rankings. Those unranked are sorted alphabetically.

Amounts: Borrowing amounts displayed are complete ranges (across every term available).

Closures: Credio, H&T Finance (web), In-Sync Credit Services, MPP Money, NextCredit, Oakam, Pixie Loans, Pogo Loans, Pounds Till Payday, Quidie, Tiger Loans Company, Track Loans, WageDayAdvance, Wonga & Zippa Loans. More recent: PiggyBank, Quick Loans Express, QuickQuid & Swift Sterling. Now brokering only: Peachy.

Examples: £300 costs have been sampled. The exceptions are Quick Loan Shop where £600 is shown since instalments require £400+, The Money Platform’s sums also rise in £250 increments and so £250 is displayed and finally £100 was added for Care Finance and Loans since they only extend to £150.

Best Prime Deal

5) Fund Ourselves: £104.49

Feefo.com (5* Percentage + Exact 5* Counts)

3) MoneyBoat: 94% (3840+)

Prime: Drafty

The cheapest 3 month loan available on the market comes from Drafty at £48.60 per £300. If you have a fair to good credit score then this would be the obvious choice due to the excellent value. As being a line of credit you can of course borrow up to your set limit 24/7. This limit would usually be a sizeable one also at £3000 (new customers) and £5000 (future potential). A further positive with Drafty is that their service has attracted great reviews noting 95% (Reviews.co.uk) and 92% (Trustpilot). Drafty’s Alexa rank shows that they are coming along well that isn’t surprising being that it’s from the same team behind Lending Stream.

Subprime: Satsuma Loans

The bulk of page listings are subprime specialised. There are many great options available to choose from, but overall we’d just edge it to Satsuma at this time. Their charges were £129.26 (weekly) or £142.80 (monthly) that are competitive. What’s ideal with Satsuma is that you can pick any single month between 3 and 12. They are also open on Saturdays and above all else are highly trusted, as part of the historic Provident Financial group. A service limitation is that they often promote and send account messages to customers that they could be eligible for another concurrent loan. For this, they base the decision on a new credit search and not on your track record (declines are common from this). You would have thought that it would make sense to offer auto top-ups on an existing loan based on past successful payments. Outside of this lender, there are some excellent instalment loan deals at Anico Finance (£73.50), Auden (£102.09) and Fund Ourselves (£104.49).

Last Update: February 14th, 2020