I finally feel like I have to speak out about this issue -- Kyle and I both have student loans from our undergraduate degrees. I took out loans with Sallie Mae and Kyle's loans were turned over to FedLoans in 2010. While paying on my loans with Sallie Mae, I had no trouble at all. Their website was easy to maneuver and their customer service was excellent. When I went into graduate school, the remainder of my loans went in deferment just in time for us to start paying on Kyle's loans. We've been paying on his loans since November with FedLoan and have had nothing but trouble. We decided that we would control the payments and didn't sign up for automatic debit. When we first set up our account in November, the payment went through, no problem. We set it up with our checking account, made the payment early and things were fine. In December, however, we went to make the same payment a week early, and it said that our account was "invaild." We knew we had more than enough money in the account to pay the loan and we contacted our bank. They couldn't find anything wrong on their end and said they couldn't even see a payment trying to be processed. There was a faulty link somewhere. After that, we got back in touch with FedLoans and told them that we'd already contacted our bank. The customer service representative basically told us that there was nothing that she could do and we needed to figure it out on our own. After that, we tried adding on another account -- our savings this time. The account linked like a charm and we've made payments out of it for the last two months....until today. We tried to make a payment today from our savings and *bam* same problem. The account is all of a sudden "invalid." We again called the service number and tried to make a payment over the phone. Again, both accounts were invalid. We talked to a customer rep and again, there's just "nothing they can do."
Through the frustration of all of this, I Googled "fedloan servicing." Much to my encouragement (and dismay since this appears to be such an issue) I found that Kyle and I are not alone in these types of issues. I've just been reading about scam after scam after scam. Many people have responded with the same concerns and unfortunately there appears to be no answers. I've especially been intrigued by Robert Farrington's writings, which can be found here: http://thecollegeinvestor.com/157/fedloan-servicing-the-worst-student-loan-servicer/. As he's stated, FedLoan appears to be the "Worst Loan Servicer."
I hope writing about it gives this issue (another) voice. In the meantime, we'll by trying to "figure out" this problem. If anyone has any advice, it would be much appreciated! I hope this can also be a helpful warning and testimony to those working with FedLoans. Make sure to research who you are dealing with! Many of the stories from the link above are much more worrisome than ours!
*Image courtesy of Google search.
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