Case studies

Peta Lee-lo and her husband have 5 children and live on her husband’s wage and family support. They bought an $800 dining table and 6 chairs from a mobile truck. They have been paying off the items for more than 2 years but have still not completed repayments. Each time a payment is missed, a dishonour fee is added to their debt.

Peta has also bought clothes for her children from the trucks including winter trousers, a jacket and socks. She says the vendor told her she wouldn’t be charged interest and she also liked the fact that the truck came to her door. The family is paying $10 a week towards the clothing debt and $10 towards what is owing on the furniture. Peta says once the money has been repaid, she will not buy from the trucks again. “Because of my account we’re not paying for groceries. I want to finish it.”

Maria

Maria Fagavaa has bought clothes for her son from the trucks. She was charged $180 for a jersey for her 17-year-old son and more than $150 for a pair of combat pants. She also bought a phone. Maria still has $600 of debt to pay off to the company. She is making payments of $20 a week but each time she misses a payment a $15 default fee is added to her debt. Maria is on a benefit and her youngest son still lives at home. Both he and her 35-year-old son have hereditary conditions which mean they will require dialysis for the rest of their lives. The 17-year-old has 4 hours of dialysis 3 times a week, returning from school in the afternoons and then heading to the clinic for treatment.

Maria says she bought from the trucks because her son needed clothes and because the mobile vendors did not require her to pay money upfront. She also thought it was important her son had a phone because of his health condition, and she didn’t have cash to buy a phone from a retail outlet. “I never do that anymore. I stopped it. When I finish [paying] that, no more.”

Te Pari

Te Pari Greaves is paying more than $200 a week on debts owed to mobile trucks and payday lenders. The young father has a three-year-old son and lives on a benefit of $395 a week, paying rent of $95. He says he buys “everything” from mobile trucks because he receives what he purchases instantly.

Te Pari has purchased food, clothes for his son, appliances and furniture from the trucks. “Now me and my son are living on $15 because of all the clothing trucks.”

He says he paid $500 for a barbecue hamper; $40 for a set of tomato, soya and Worcestershire sauces; and $30 for a packet of cornflakes or rice bubbles. Te Pari also signed up in November 2014 to buy a television, which he has yet to receive. He was told he would receive the TV before Christmas and started making payments of $25 a week from November but it has not yet been delivered. He says the mobile truck company told him it had not brought the television as he had missed some payments. Two weeks in a row, he has been promised that it would arrive “next week”.

He also bought a phone from a truck vendor, but the phone was stolen when he had just finished paying it off. The washing machine he bought broke down and when he tried to contact the vendor under the warranty, he was told the company had moved to Australia.

Te Pari’s debts are to multiple mobile trucks. He says he has no idea of how much he owes altogether. “They don’t give you the actual total amount. I’ve had enough of them. I’m trying slowly to pay them off and get rid of them. My son’s missing out.”

Palasi

Palasi Taleo’s teenage son signed up to buy a phone from a mobile truck company. He didn’t receive the phone and Palasi took him to the bank to find out what was happening. They discovered $200 had been deducted from the son’s bank account in weekly sums of $25.

When Palasi rang the company, she was told that no one of the name given by the salesperson worked for the firm. Her son never received the phone and did not get his money back. “I told him ‘From now on don’t do anything when the salespeople come.’ You rather pay cash.”