Abound personal loan (formerly Fintern loans) review
Abound, formerly known as Fintern, is a UK lender that promises to offer borrowing "reinvented", with affordable tailored loans. Loan amounts between £1,000 and £10,000 starting from 25.8%.
Abound promises to offer competitive, personalised loans that are calculated on your ability to repay and not your credit score, which could make it a worthwhile option for borrowers with poor or limited credit history. With its innovative approach to loan repayments, Abound could also help customers looking for more flexibility in how and when they repay their loan.
Best for: Bad credit
Pros
Quick decisions
Overpay with no fee
Uses Open-Banking to assess affordability
Loans are available to those with good or bad credit
Cons
You’ll need to connect to Open Banking
There may be additional fees if you change your repayment plan
Only repaying the minimum amount will mean you pay more in interest overall
Representative example: £2,000 loan repayable over 36 months. 36 monthly payments of £77.60. Rate of interest 20.2% p.a. (fixed). Representative 25.8% APR. Total amount repayable £2,793.60.
Abound is looking to make personal lending more accessible, offering loans based on what you can afford to repay, not your credit score.
Abound rebranded in 2022 and was previously known as Fintern. If you’re an existing Fintern customer, don’t panic, you don’t need to do anything differently and can still repay your loan through the Fintern app, however if you’re eagle-eyed, you might have noticed that your statements have automatically transferred over to Abound.
How does Abound compare against other lenders?
Table: sorted by representative APR, promoted deals first
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Please note: You should always refer to your loan agreement for exact repayment amounts as they may vary from our results.
Late repayments can cause you serious money problems. See our debt help guides.
What is Abound?
Abound is a personal lender based in the UK that offers low cost loans for customers who have struggled to get approved for personal loans from traditional lenders. Instead of approving you based on your credit score, Abound aims to offer personalised loans based on how much you can afford to borrow.
How do Abound loans work?
Abound offers unsecured loans from £1,000.00 to £10,000.00, with loan terms of up to and a representative 25.8% APR (variable). Unlike most lenders, Abound does not base its lending decisions on your credit score. Instead it uses AI and Open Banking to determine how much you can afford to borrow. As a result, Abound loans are available to those with both good and bad credit history.
Abound doesn’t give you a set monthly repayment plan when offering a loan. Instead, the Abound app will calculate the cost and length of your loan and suggest how much you repay a month, and how long it would take to repay if you made higher repayments each month.
Late repayments can cause you serious money problems. See our debt help guides.
Is Abound a broker or a lender?
Abound is a lender, not a broker. Therefore it offers loans directly to customers.
Is Abound safe to use?
Abound Ltd is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA). It uses consents.online’s Open Banking tool, which is subject to UK and EU data protection laws and regulated by the FCA.
When you allow Abound to access your financial information via Open Banking, it will only have secure read-only access to your historical banking data.
What can I use a Abound loan for?
You can use a Abound loan for any worthwhile purpose. This could include covering the cost of large purchases or expenses such as a car, holiday, wedding, home renovations or general costs. As with most lenders, you won’t be able to use a Abound personal loan for gambling, investing or any illegal activities.
Eligibility criteria
To be eligible for a Abound loan, you’ll need to meet the following criteria:
Be at least 18 years old
Be a UK resident
Have a UK bank account with Open Banking access
How to apply for a Abound loan
Download the Abound app
Fill out the online form and connect to Open Banking
Abound will then offer you a range of repayment options
Select the repayment structure you’d like to use
Finish setting up your Abound account by providing ID and submit your application
How will Abound assess my loan application?
When you apply for a loan, Abound will assess your eligibility using Open Banking and determine how much you can afford to borrow. It uses your banking and financial history to calculate what you can afford to pay each month, then gives you a minimum and maximum monthly payment amount.
Abound will also perform a “soft” credit check when you apply for a loan, but this has no impact on your credit score.
How long does it take to get a Abound loan?
Abound states that it can take a day to get a decision on your Abound loan application. Once your application has been approved, you should receive your funds within 48 hours, but it may take up to 7 days.
How do repayments work?
Unlike regular personal loans that offer a fixed monthly repayment, Abound loans allow you to adjust how much you pay each month, within a specific range. Your repayments are collected via a continuous payment authority (CPA), which is a form of direct debit that is taken from your bank account.
Can I repay a Abound loan early?
Yes, you can repay your loan early or make additional repayments without being charged any fees.
Does Abound offer repayment holidays?
Yes, you can also request a payment holiday for up to two months at any time by using the Abound app. This will need to be approved by Abound and you’ll be charged £15 for a one-month payment holiday, and £30 for a two-month payment holiday.
Interest will also continue to accrue during the repayment holiday. Once the holiday period has finished, you can choose to either extend the length of your loan term or increase the size of your monthly repayments.
Abound loans app
Its worth highlighting that you’ll need to download the Abound app to apply for and pay back a loan. You can also request repayment changes, payment holidays, making additional repayments and reviewing your loan. The app is free to use and availabe on both the App store and Google Play Store.
Pros and cons of Abound loans
Pros
Personalised loans with flexible repayments based on how much you can afford to repay
It does not use your credit score to determine your eligibility
Loans are available to those with good or bad credit
Cons
Only repaying the minimum amount will mean you pay more in interest overall
You’ll need to connect to Open Banking
There may be additional fees if you change your repayment plan
Abound customer reviews
In our 2023 customer satisfaction survey, Abound scored 3.5 out of 5 stars with 80% of its customers saying they’d recommend the brand to a friend.
Several customers in our survey commented positively on Abound’s overall service. One commented: “Good service and easy to use”. Yet one customer commented they experienced “a lot of paperwork”.
Our verdict
Abound promises to offer competitive, personalised loans that are calculated on your ability to repay and not your credit score, which could make it a worthwhile option for borrowers with poor or limited credit history.
With its innovative approach to loan repayments, Abound could also help customers looking for more flexibility in how and when they repay their loan.
Frequently asked questions
Yes.
Abound can check your eligibility for a loan through a “soft” search of your credit file (which has no impact on your credit score) in conjunction with an evaluation of your current account transaction history (if you allow Abound read-only access through open banking).
If this indicates that you’d be eligible, you can then opt to formally apply, at which point a “hard” credit search takes place.
Abound supports a large number of banks, including:
Allied Irish
B Bank
Bank of Scotland
Bank of Ireland
Barclays
Clydesdale Bank
Cumberland Building Society
Danske
First Direct
First Trust Bank
Halifax
HSBC
Lloyds Bank
M&S Bank
Monzo
Nationwide Building Society
Natwest
RBS
Revolut
Santander
Starling Bank
Tesco Bank
TSB
Ulster Bank
Virgin Money
Yorkshire Bank
If you’re struggling to repay your loan, you should contact Abound as soon as possible to discuss your options.
Yes. Abound is a trading name of Fintern Limited, which is authorised and regulated by the FCA.
We show offers we can track - that's not every product on the market...yet. Unless we've said otherwise, products are in no particular order. The terms "best", "top", "cheap" (and variations of these) aren't ratings, though we always explain what's great about a product when we highlight it. This is subject to our terms of use. When you make major financial decisions, consider getting independent financial advice. Always consider your own circumstances when you compare products so you get what's right for you. Most of the data in Finder's comparison tables has the source: Moneyfacts Group PLC. In other cases, Finder has sourced data directly from providers.
Tom Stelzer is a writer for Finder specialising in personal finance, including loans and credit, as well as small business and business loans. He has previously worked as a freelance writer covering entertainment, culture and football for publications like FourFourTwo and Man of Many. He has a Master of Media Arts and Production and Bachelor of Communications in Journalism from the University of Technology Sydney. See full bio
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