Nieuczciwe praktyki w zakresie refinansowania z wykorzystaniem krótkoterminowych pożyczek

Abstract

The purpose of this article is to present civil law mechanisms protecting consumers against unfair practices of the financial market. Companies that grant loans often bypass statutory cost limits out of concern for their own economic interests to the detriment of their customers. There-fore, it is important to point out unfair practices to which consumers are subjected by entrepre-neurs operating in the loan services sector.The work indicates the sources of consumer protection at the national and European level, which are to counteract the violation of consumer rights in commercial transactions sensu largo. It should be stressed that the consumer in asymmetrical relations is a subject particularly vulnerable to unfair practices of the trader, who often uses his advantage, especially his information ad-vantage, to gain additional income by imposing on the consumer a number of financial burdens (usually not equivalent to the costs incurred by the trader), resulting in harming the weaker party to the loan contract, i.e. the consumer. The market of financial services that specialise in granting short-term loans is not subject to control by the Polish Financial Supervision Authority (KNF), which encourages unfair market practices, therefore it is important to notice the problem of lack of state supervision over the activities of such companies. This paper is the result of analysis of case-law and literature in the field of non-bank fi-nancial services.