PETALING JAYA: A 28-year-old salon owner’s bid for a RM200,000 loan from a social media lender cost her RM146,020 in savings.
According to Berita Harian, Johor Bahru Selatan police district chief Assistant Commissioner, Raub Selamat, stated that a police report was lodged by the victim two days ago.
The victim was deceived by a syndicate offering non-existent online loans after seeing a loan advertisement on social media last week.
“The victim contacted the phone number listed in the advertisement and was explained the monthly payment rates by the company’s employee.
“The victim was interested in taking a loan of RM200,000 and provided personal details and bank account statements to the suspect for the loan application.
“The suspect also deceived the victim by asking her to make payments for stamp duty and credit scoring, promising that the loan would be disbursed once these payments were made,“ he said in a statement today.
Raub stated that the victim followed the suspect’s instructions and made payments totaling RM146,020 through 16 transactions to various local bank accounts.
“After the payments were made, the suspect pressured the victim to make additional payments to obtain the loan. However, the victim refused to do so.
“To date, the victim has not received the promised loan,“ he added.
