Federal Push To Scale Back Payday Loan Regulations

CHICAGO (CBS) -- It's advertised as a way to get cash quick, but for some payday lending users it can also create a cycle of debt. Now there is a push at the federal level to roll back regulations.

"It's a trap. Yes, we feel that it is a trap," said Laura Varela, who is still paying off her payday loan.

She and her husband Marco needed cash, so they took a payday loan out from one of the dozens of stores around Chicago. That was three years ago.

"We don't have another way to take it," she said. "We didn't have another option."

Payday loans are typically a few hundred dollars. The person borrowing agrees to pay the cash back but with annual percentage interest rates as high as 400%, due by their next paycheck.

"In Chicago most of the predatory lenders have set up shop in mostly black and Hispanic communities," said Raul Raymundo, CEO of the Resurrection Project.

Raymundo fears a new proposed change by the Federal Consumer Financial Protection Bureau will have a crippling and expensive impact on those who desperately rely on payday loans.

"They aren't even going to check to see if they have the ability to pay," Raymundo said. "they are just going to make these loans and then trap them."

The CFPB wants to do away with a 2017 rule requiring payday lenders to verify that the person borrowing has the means to pay it back, saying it is "concerned that these provisions would reduce access to credit."

"Foolish because we will repeat the things that happened almost a decade ago," Raymundo said.

"It's always that we are paying, and we are close and still paying and still struggle," said Varela.

Wednesday is the cutoff for the public to submit comments to CFPB through its website.