Payday loan along with payday lender and payday lending appear in The Barnhart Dictionary Companion (Vol. 12.3; Spring 2000). The earliest date there is also 1985. Regards, David K. Barnhart, Editor/ PUBLISHER The Barnhart Dictionary Companion [quarterly] barnhart at highlands.com www.highlands.com/Lexik "Necessity obliges us to neologize." Thomas Jefferson-August 16, 1813