Saturday, January 14, 2012

Student Loan Wha?

Direct Loans, which owns all of my student loans recently changed websites.  The new site is easier to use, and looks better, but I've been having a whole lot of issues with it that have nothing to do with appearance.

  1. I've tried to set up Kwikpay (I also have an issue with that spelling--what the hell is that all about?), which is the automatic debiting system about TEN times.  I tell kwikpay that I want $100 taken out of my savings account each month, but for the last three months, no money was taken out and I was behind.
  2. I then make manual payments using the same savings account that I have always used and that the system has verefied is correct, and I get a confirmation that the payment posted, but the money never leaves my account!
  3. Then, the payment that I made vanishes from the list of payments made (where it had been before), and I get an angry "past due" red line.
  4. I keep getting messages from Direct Loans in my "Secure Messages" folder, but when I try to open them, I get an error message saying that the message cannot be opened. I hope what they want to tell me isn't important, but I fear it is.
So basically, I'm trying to send these people money, and they won't take it, but are penalizing me for their not taking it.  I called them a while ago to say that this was happening, and the nice man that I spoke to said, "I see that you made a payment for $300 about five days ago."

"Yes," I told him, "But that money is still in my account."

I could practically hear him shrugging, and he said, "Everything looks ok to me."

I wanted to make a big payment before the end of the year, and did, but Direct Loans never took the money.  I then made a big payment at the beginning of January to catch up on how past due I was, and Direct Loans never took that one either.  I have confirmation emails from Direct Loans saying "we will happily take your money" but they never do!

This is honestly the strangest situation I've ever been in, moneywise, and I really don't know what to do to rectify it.  Anyone else having any issues?  Any of my readers work for Direct Loans?

4 comments:

  1. I had several issues with Direct Loans as well! When they first changed to the new system, my money wasn't being taken out on time, so it kept saying that my payment was late. Of course I freaked out about this, so I gave them a call and the customer service representative explained that the payments were being debited late, so it would appear late on my account, but I would not be penalized for it. It seems to me, at least from what I have experienced/researched, is that they are very well aware of the issues happening with the transition to their new website, so people who are trying to pay or are paying late because of their system, won't be penalized.

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  2. Well I'm glad I'm not the only one! It's getting annoying though because I just want that money out of my account so I know where I stand, but as long as I'm not getting penalized, I guess it doesn't matter :)

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  3. I hate, hate, hate the new system! Since my loan is in forbearance with lower monthly payments, the new system claims I don't need to make any payments until the forbearance ends. Which isn't true. Except Kwik-Pay only lets you set up electronic payment for the original total monthly amount due. Which is much more than my forbearance payment.
    I finally figured out that I could make automatic payments to them for the right forbearance only amount, but only if my bank was sending them the money (as opposed to Direct Loans automatically taking it).
    Of course, this was only after missing payments as well and spending forever on the phone with them.

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  4. I haven't had a problem with Direct Loans taking out my (already set up) automatic withdrawal, but I hate their new site. And then there's the sidebar that says you can look at your 2011 tax info, only when you follow the link it says that they're still working on it. At one point the message read that it would be available on Jan. 7. Yeah, right.

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