HIRE-PURCHASE SYSTEM

Press, Volume LXXXVII, Issue 26529, 18 September 1951, Page 6

HIRE-PURCHASE SYSTEM

CHANGES THOUGHT DESIRABLE

NATIONAL COUNCIL OF WOMEN (New Zealand Press Association)

WELLINGTON, September 17. No goods should be sold under a hire-purchase agreement without a substantial deposit; the seller should be required on the contract to give the ordinary purchase and the hire-, purchase price; if payments cease after two-thirds of the purchase price has been paid, the purchaser should be liable to be summoned only for the part of the price remaining unpaid and the goods should not be removed. These decisions were made at a meeting to-day of the Dominion executive of the National Council of Women. It was said that the abnormal increase in time-payment and cash order trading over the last 15 years was an outcome of the Law Reform Act, 1936. This amended the Married Women’s Property Act, and provides that a married woman shall be subject to the law relating to the enforcement of court judgments and orders. The effect of this amendment was a rapid growth of business methods that enticed many women to acquire goods beyond their financial means, the creditor in some instances knowing that the money would be found somehow when the debtor was threatened' with imprisonment.

In a survey of furniture prices, it was found that even the cash price asked by some firms chiefly engaged in hire-purchase trading was higher than the cash prices of a firm dealing in high-class furniture of the same type that did not use the credit system. The social worker who had to deal with some of the effects of extravagance and improvidence encouraged by this type of business deplored the fact that goods were sold to married women without the husband’s signature to the hire-purchase agreement and in many cases without his knowledge. Evidence was found by the council of young couples, particularly those moving into new housing settlements, succumbing to the temptation to acquire furniture, carpets, and other goods far beyond their means and needs, and who were so financially involved that they were going short of food and firing and suffering hardship. An undesirable aspect was that young mothers were going out to work to meet the commitments. The result of its investigations was that the council considered indiscriminate credit for goods on hire-pur-chase and cash orders constituted a social problem, and that the public, particularly women, should be protected from unfair practice by those who sought to exploit the needs, misfortunes and foolish improvidence of their fellow citizens. It recommended that it be mandatory for traders selling goods under the hire-purchase system to married people to obtain the signature of both parties to the hire-purchase agreement.