Western Sky Financial is an installment loan company who claims that you can get up to $2,525 in your checking account overnight by completing an application that takes less than 5 minutes to fill out.
Western Sky Financial operates within the boundaries of the Cheyenne River Sioux Reservation, which is a sovereign nation within the United States. It is owned by an individual within that nation and not the Cheyenne River Sioux Reservation itself.
Recently, the Western Sky commercials have been generating a lot of buzz online, mostly because people find them humorous but also because some people are questioning the claims made in the commercial, specifically your ability to receive thousands of dollars overnight.
It Is Expensive, But There Is No Collateral Required
In the commercial, the spokesman claims “Yes, the money is expensive, but there is no collateral required.” This is a common theme within the payday loan industry.
Before you borrow money from Western Sky, look at their Rates page which describes the APR as well as the loan fee that will be assessed depending on the loan amount you are requesting.
The APR, or Annual Percentage Rate, is the amount of interest you will be required to pay back within a year. When loan companies do not require collateral or high credit scores to approve a loan, it is generally because the APR they charge is extremely high.
In the case of Western Sky, the lowest available APR is 116.73% and can be as high as 215.03%. This means that if you borrow $5,000 from Western Sky at 116.73% APR and take the full 84 months to pay it back, you will have paid $35,872.72 in interest.
The Bottom Line on Western Sky
In the US, individual states have laws that govern payday loan companies and are meant to protect the borrowers from extreme APRs and unrealistic payback schedules.
In the past when Reviewopedia has reviewed online payday loan companies, I have pointed out that borrowing from an online company that is based in another state may make it difficult for your state laws to protect you from predatory lending practices.
In the case of Western Sky, this is further complicated by the fact that Western Sky is based in the Cheyenne River Sioux Reservation, which acts as an independent nation within the US, meaning that you could potentially have no protection from them at all.
Note: If you’re interested in learning more about Payday Loans check out our detailed guide, “Payday Loans Explained: Should You Ever Get One?” for more info.
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Terrible experience and am reporting to credit agencies my experience and also Better Business bureau, etc.
Do not trust.
Also, I don't know for sure since they say they operate out of an Indian reservation, but if you do default, they have to successfully sue you first in a US legal court to even be allowed to garnish your paycheck or seize any of your assets. I'm not saying to work with them, OBVIOUSLY they are scammers, (I mean come on people, have you never worked with payday loan types before, or know about them and how it all works?!), so I'm shocked anyone at any time could possibly think otherwise! HOWEVER, my point is, I don't know how easy it is for them to come to try to actually legally -take- your assets as payment. Someone should talk to a lawyer about this. I am curious to know how enforceable their rules actually are. If we can't get protection from them due to their reservation/Indian nation status, then how easily can they come after a regular member of the public, in the state courts?? I'm wondering if they can't.
If anyone here has info on this, I would be interested to know. I mean, if they actually can't, then conceivably, someone could just borrow from them, and default. Other than reporting it to the credit bureaus, what exact recourse do they have?? Seems like not much. That would be my first question.
Like I said initially, if they CAN take you to a county/state court for it, even then, each state has its own limits on what can be garnished from a person's pay and in a lot of cases, a house and car won't be allowed to be seized. But I'm not a lawyer so I wouldn't know the exact details, and it would vary by state. Also, I'd want to know which state's laws would apply if an when this did happen?? The state that Western Sky operates out of (if state's laws even apply to Indian affairs in this case), or the state you as the borrower are in.
The major network running advertisements for this company
are aiding and abetting in this scam for a profit.
Not only does the company charge %89 they keep up to one third
Of the money you borrow as an up front fee.
Help to save a financial life and notify the network or networks advertising for this company to stop the ads.