Loan sharks generally operate in the poorer areas of a city where the people do not have any assets that they can offset against a loan. Some indulge in illegal activities such as taking charge of a person’s bank card or family allowance book as a guarantee that the money will be repaid. In some cases the person who makes the loan may get very nasty if the borrower is not on time with their payments. People have been subjected to violence because they have had a doorstep loan and got behind with their repayments.
If you can possibly avoid it you should never borrow money from a doorstep loans salesman as you never can tell whether they are a loan shark, or connected to a loan shark who is not above using violence or some other illegal means to get their money back. Another serious problem with borrowing money in this way is that the interest is often far more than the original amount that was borrowed. People fall into arrears with these loans because they just cannot keep up with the exorbitant repayment arrangements, and this can lead to a lot more problems than a shortage of cash.