Great Plains Lending and Plain Green Loans have stopped marketing new loans pending the outcome of a court case in which the NY Attorney General sued another payday lender for offering loans in the State of New York. Both these lenders are operated by Think Finance as tribal entities under the premise that they can export their tribal laws into states. The New York regulator's position is that it has the authority to regulate tribal lenders doing business in New York. They sent cease-and-desist orders to many online payday lenders offering loans New York.
Both Great Plains Lending and Plain Green Loans stopped marketing in the middle of August 2013 and very briefly re-started marketing on Oct 1, 2013 but quickly stopped again after The U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York ruled in favor of New York. It ruled that the state can regulate lenders making loans to New York state residents even when loans are originated from offices on tribal land.
The American Banker reports on this as well: NY Can Regulate Lenders with Tribal Ties.
Since reporting on this change at the end of 2013 we have not seen a change in marketing from either Great Plains Lending or Plain Green Loans. There has been a notable industry-wide shift away from the tribal lending model. Or, to be more specific, we have seen tribal lenders taking a more stealth mode to marketing while new entrants have entered the space but are pursuing the state license path. It appears Think Finance, the main operators of Great Plains and Plain Green, is taking the same approach. They continue to invest online marketing dollars into, Rise Credit, their other short-term loan business, while stopping with the other two. We do not anticipate a change in this approach in the near future.
In general, The Payday Hound prefers state-licensed lenders as they generally have additional oversight from state regulators.
Thus, if you need an installment loan you might consider Rise Credit, Net Credit, Avant. These are all more recent entrants into the short-term lending space and are all state licensed. Also see Installment Lenders for additional state-licensed lenders.