When you couple this with the rising cost of everyday expenses like food, it isn't hard to see how the budgets across America are stretched to breaking point. One of the key problems that people have today is they don't know where to turn whenever disaster or emergency strikes.

The answer to this question more frequently than ever is that they are turning to payday loans. Almost 40% of Americans are less than two months away from bankruptcy. The savings rates in America are at an all-time low and many households don't have any savings at all.

Quite the opposite, they are drowning in debt and their stock portfolios and property portfolios have lost an incredible amount of value. This is reflected in the type of customers which now approach payday loan companies to help in times of financial difficulty.

Many people think that they are generally people on the bottom rung of society's ladder. This couldn't be further from the truth. The vast majority of payday loan customers are middle-class Americans. 44% of them their own homes and 42% of them have a college education. They are predominantly under 45 and have a family to feed.

That means if a household loses an income provider, they must replace that income within eight weeks or face the real prospect of losing their home, their car and all their possessions. In order to try and prevent this fate befalling millions of Americans, payday loan companies have stepped into the breach.

They will lend money with no regard to your previous credit record and in fact your previous credit record and will not even be checked. In addition, the transaction is never reported to credit reference agencies.

The money they will forward to you is simple, fast and easy. After a two-minute application, typically made on a website, the money is forwarded to your checking account in say 24 hours upon acceptance within a couple of hours. The main conditions for acceptance are that you have a job, a checking account and are over 18 years of age.

Once the payday loans company has verified these simple facts, your money is deposited. Once you get the money, you agree a date with the payday loan company and the money is withdrawn dramatically from your checking account on the date on which you specify.

This normally coincides with your next pay cheque date. In most cases, the time limit for a repayment is around 14 days. This means that this type of loan isn't available to remodelling your kitchen or buy new toys.

It is genuinely and specifically designed to help you in an emergency. If you have a problem and you need urgent cash with very few questions asked and no reference to your previous credit history, the ideal solution for you could be payday loans.