Tampa Based Pay Day Loan Scheme

Federal Trade Commission, a U.S. district court has halted a Tampa, Fla.-based operation that promised to help consumers get payday loans.

The FTC alleges that defendants Sean C. Mulrooney and Odafe Stephen Ogaga and five companies they controlled used websites with the names Vantage Funding, Ideal Advance, Loan Assistance Company, Palm Loan Advances, Loan Tree Advances, Pacific Advances, and Your Loan Funding to collect consumers’ information. They collected names, Social Security numbers, bank routing numbers, and bank account numbers, which allowed them to access consumers’ checking accounts.

The defendants victimized tens of thousands of consumers, taking more than $5 million from their bank accounts, the agency alleges.

In two previous cases, American Credit Crunchers, LLC and Broadway Global Master Inc., the defendants allegedly attempted to collect on payday loan debts that either didn’t exist or weren’t owed to them.
For additional consumer information on payday loans, see, Online Payday Loans.