Have you applied for Biden's SAVE student loan repayment plan? Photographer: Bing Guan/Bloomberg Bing Guan/Bloomberg/Getty Images The university offers undergraduate and graduate degrees in arts and sciences, business, dentistry, education, engineering, law, medicine, nursing, pharmacy, and social work. Graduates during the Columbia University commencement convocation in New York, US, on Wednesday, May 17, 2023. She called the day before at breakfast, again at lunch, and then asked for an automatic callback but said she never received one. “I have hit the three-hour mark,” said Marlee Lane, as she was on hold Wednesday with her student loan servicer EdFinancial for the fourth time in two days. The office got about $800 million less from Congress this year than what the Biden administration had asked for. Plus, lawmakers left funding flat for the Federal Student Aid office, which oversees the financial aid system, despite its bigger workload this year. Many others have different loan servicers now than the last time they made a payment because several companies ended their contracts during the past three years. Millions of people who finished school during the pause are making their payments for the first time. The freeze went into place in March 2020 and was extended several times before Congress prohibited another delay. Bickel/USA Today NetworkĤ million people enroll in Biden's SAVE student loan repayment plan ahead of payment restartīut it’s been more than three years since most federal student loan borrowers have been required to make a payment. Graduates in the College of Arts and Sciences during Ohio State University's 418th Commencement on Sunday, at Ohio Stadium in Columbus, Ohio. Like before the Covid-19 pandemic, borrowers will make their payments to student loan servicers that are hired by the Department of Education. Interest has already restarted and monthly payments will begin in October, though the exact due date varies by borrower. The Biden administration has also created a temporary on-ramp period through September 2024 that will shield borrowers from having a delinquency reported to credit reporting agencies if they miss a payment.īringing roughly 28 million people back into repayment at the same time is an unprecedented task and was bound to be a bumpy process. Since July, the department has sent more than 130 million emails and 8 million text messages to borrowers about resources and tools available to support them during the return to repayment. “The department is working closely with student loan servicers, to ensure that they are doing everything to provide borrowers the information they need when they need it, and holding them accountable when they do not,” the agency said in a statement sent to CNN. Aidvantage’s parent company Maximus referred CNN to the Department of Education. CNNĮdFinancial and Nelnet did not respond to CNN’s request for comment. This screenshot of the Aidvantage website taken by CNN shows account access for customers temporarily down on August 6. “Our finances are stretched extremely thin as it is and having to pay any additional amount is going to put us in real trouble,” Wahlin said. Her wife recently started graduate school, creating a tight budget for the couple. “Not knowing how much I’ll be paying has been a huge mental stressor on us,” said Wahlin, who has student debt from both undergraduate and graduate school. Some are having to wait hours on hold to find out how much they owe, what day their first payment is due, or to make an early payment to avoid paying interest – which resumed accruing on federal student loans on September 1.Īnd servicer websites, including Aidvantage and Nelnet, have been sporadically down over the past week as high volumes of borrowers try to access their accounts.ĭanika Wahlin, 28, is hoping she qualifies for a $0 monthly payment under the new income-driven payment plan known as SAVE (Saving on a Valuable Education).īut it’s only her best guess, because her payment amount is not available when she logs in to her loan servicer, EdFinancial Services.ĮdFinancial is transitioning to a new loan servicing platform, and, according to a message Wahlin received last week, is “still working on getting” her loans into its new system. With less than a month before federal student loan payments restart after the years-long pandemic pause, many borrowers are having a hard time connecting with their loan servicer.
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