Check a moneylender against the Ministry of Law's list before you deal with it.
Go to mlaw.gov.sg on your phone or computer now and pull up the Ministry of Law's published list of licensed moneylenders. Each lender on it has three details beside it: its business name, its licence details and the address of its place of business. You will match any lender you come across against those three details.
Moneylending in Singapore needs a licence. The Registry of Moneylenders sits within the Ministry of Law and licenses and regulates moneylenders under the Moneylenders Act. Anyone who lends money as a business without a licence is breaking the law, unless the Act treats them as an excluded moneylender or an exempt moneylender. Banks do not need a moneylender's licence because they count as excluded moneylenders, which is a separate legal category from exempt moneylenders. Plenty of people in Singapore take loans from moneylenders legally, and the published list is how you tell those lenders apart from the rest.
A licensed moneylender is a lender that appears on the Ministry's list. No other list counts. If a lender isn't on it, it isn't licensed, no matter what its own website claims.
Back in module 7, Kumar was waiting for a counselling session when they typed "fast cash loan Singapore" into a search engine. Dozens of names came up. Most sounded official, many promised approval in an hour, and a few gave addresses in shopping centres Kumar recognised. One carried a name almost the same as a lender Kumar's colleague had once used. Kumar couldn't tell which results were genuine and felt pressed to act, which is the feeling online ads for fast loans count on.
Kumar didn't borrow, and the counsellor said afterwards that this was right for Kumar's situation. When the near-identical name was checked, it differed by one word from a licensed lender's name, and it gave a mobile number and no address. Calling it would have put Kumar in touch with someone who had copied a real lender on purpose to use the trust people have in it.
The illegal lenders that do the most harm usually look legitimate, since they imitate real ones. They might use a name one letter off from a licensed lender's, a logo that looks familiar, an address in the same building as a real lender, or website text taken from the real lender's site.
Copy the business name exactly as the advertisement or website shows it. Look it up on the Ministry of Law's list at mlaw.gov.sg. When you find the closest entry, go through the name one letter at a time, then check the licence details, then check the place of business address.
If the name is near but not the same, or the address doesn't match, treat the lender as unlicensed. An ad that offers just a phone number or a messaging contact, with no business name or address you can look up, is enough on its own for you to walk away.
Most illegal lenders get caught out by the advertising rule. A licensed moneylender can only advertise through approved advertising channels, which are:
the lender's own business website business or consumer directories advertisements inside and outside the lender's own place of business
SMS, WhatsApp and other messaging apps are off limits for marketing, and so is cold-calling. If a loan offer reaches your phone without you asking, whether as a text, a message or a call, it didn't come from a licensed moneylender who is following the rules. Lesson 8.2, How loan sharks find you and what happens next, covers what such offers usually turn out to be. The Ministry of Law website has the current advertising rules; read them once so you can spot a breach when you meet one.
The Ministry of Law sets limits covering the interest rate, late interest, late fees, the upfront administrative fee, and the total of all charges a borrower can be made to pay on a loan. Some borrowers also face a cap on how much they can borrow, based on their income. Because the Ministry sets these limits and may change them, look up the current rules on its website before you deal with any moneylender.
The limits put a ceiling on what a loan can cost. A loan within them can still be very expensive next to a bank loan, so a lender keeping under the limits tells you nothing about whether the loan is cheap.
Turn down any lender who asks for charges above the limits, and any lender who wants money from you upfront before releasing the loan. Either request means something is wrong. The Ministry's website also sets out what a licensed moneylender has to give you, such as a written loan contract with the terms, and what nobody should ever ask you for. Go through that guidance before you meet a moneylender.
The list gets easy only after you've used it on results like the ones Kumar saw, and a quick search on your own phone will turn up plenty. Open the Ministry of Law's list in a second tab before you begin. As you go through each advertisement, write down exactly what it claims, then check its business name letter by letter, its licence details and its place of business address against the list. Mark any ad with only a phone number or messaging contact as one to walk away from.
Search online for three moneylenders, look up each name on the Ministry of Law's list, and note whether it matches exactly.
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