The Office of Fair Trading has decided against recommending a cap on the interest rates charged by high-cost credit providers such as doorstep lenders and payday loan companies.

In other words, the watchdog has given them permission to carry on ripping you off. Why?

Loan sharks promising to send the boys round unless you fork out what you owe them have been driven so far underground that most of us have no dealings in their world nowadays.

With their unlicensed industry and extortionate interest rates the Financial Services Authority was right to outlaw them. And though they still hover on the fringes of society preying on the poor and desperate, you have to ask why they risk breaking the law when there is really no need. They could still turn a brilliant profit as kosher, licensed money lenders.

There was a great Dispatches programme on Channel 4 recently which focused on how totally legal money lenders are putting the screws on ordinary, law-abiding folk by charging annual percentage rates of close to 3,000% on small loans. All this under the guise of the burgeoning Payday Loans industry.

All this talk of low interest rates is okay for those who already have a mortgage or great credit to back them up, but it is kind of puzzling when you come across loan companies offering Annual Percentage Rate (APR) of 63%!

What is that all about?

I found RealPersonalFinance online offering loans from £750 to £6,000 at 63.1% APR and have to confess, I was so amazed I investigated further.