Auto Loan Freeze

The Ministry of Finance and Public Service have decided that they are putting a freeze on auto loans. Senator Dwight Nelson, Minister without Portfolio in the Finance Ministry, says that they are having a “cash flow problem” in the Accountant General’s Department, and therefore felt an auto loan delay was necessary to get back on track.

They believe that they will be able to resume auto loan lending very quickly, and that this is a temporary situation. It was not announced immediately that the auto loan plan was to freeze them; it was only discovered after several senior public servants complained that their auto loans were not being processed.

Senator Nelson confirmed reports that the auto loan freeze was occurring, but said that it will not take long before they are back to business as usual. Nelson said that funds were being “sourced” so that they would be able to continue with auto loans as soon as that was completed. He said that he should have communicated better with the public in regards to the auto loan freeze.

The President of the Jamaica Civil Service Association, Wayne Jones, said that Nelson had informed him that there was a temporary shortage in their funds and that the auto loans might have to be temporarily postponed. He said that many auto loans were given without there being enough funds to cover them and leave enough to have the required amount of funds still there.



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