5 Live Investigates

Adrian Goldberg presents cutting edge investigative journalism, as well as taking on listeners' campaigns and consumer issues. Unwitting second-hand car buyers are being chased for hundreds of pounds in debts on loans taken out by previous owners of their car. Drivers raising finance with so-called 'logbook loans' secured on their vehicles are selling on their cars before settling their accounts. Because logbook loans are secured using a Victorian law called the Bill of Sales Act, they offer much less protection to consumers than other forms of credit. Under the Act, a borrower taking out a logbook loan actually hands ownership of the vehicle over to the lender. Not only does that mean that the borrower has no legal right to sell on the vehicle but any innocent third party buying it also has no rights of ownership. 5 live Investigates speaks to one victim who paid £1,100 for a second-hand car. A year after buying the car, the owner received a letter from a loan company to say she wasn't the legal own