Consumer complaint received 2018-10-12
Company: DISCOVER BANK
State: SC
Product: Student loan
Sub-product: Private student loan
Issue: Struggling to repay your loan
Sub-issue: Can't get other flexible options for repaying your loan

Complaint:
I graduated from XXXX XXXX XXXX University in XX/XX/2017 and entered repayment of my loans in XX/XX/2017. One loan, which was three loans in one, had a minimum payment of {$160.00} and the other loan, which was also three loans in one, had a minimum payment of upwards of {$600.00}. These payments were separate and thus due at different times of the month.The payments started out way higher than I knew I would be able to pay, due to my income ; so I applied for consolidation and was denied and tried again after 30 days and was denied again.

The first time I applied for consolidation, I was told the reason why I was denied and they couldn't consolidate my loans was because I had different cosigners and they weren't allowed to do that. The second time I was told I was denied because they had acquired one of my loans from another company and they could not consolidate them. Both times I received a denial letter in the mail that was supposed to tell me why I was denied but the letters failed to do so and instead only stated that I was denied with no clear reason as to why. Looking back now, my account says that I was denied based off of my credit score, which was never relayed to me.

Once I realized that consolidation would not work and I kept receiving hits to my credit only to be denied, my next course of action was making consistent payments only on the loan that I could afford, but this did nothing for the loan that I couldn't afford to pay, sending it into delinquency.

In the meantime, I kept getting calls from Discover threatening to ruin my credit for not being able to make the payments and they also called my cosigner ( my XXXX year old grandmother who is no longer working or able to make payments on my behalf ) threatening the same to her if she didn't pitch in to pay for my loans. I called consistently trying to figure out what I could do and what repayment assistance programs they provided for which I could possibly qualify. The next course of action was to apply for deferment. I was approved for this but it only served as a remedy for one month on one of my loans and two months on my other loan.

Once I came out of deferment, this seemed to double my minimum balance instead of adding time to the length of my loan, as discussed when I was approved for deferment. Following this I was even worse off and for sure more unable to make the minimum payment than I was previously.

After this, I attempted to get approved for the hardship repayment program since I met the qualifications of being less than 60 days delinquent and I knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that I could prove my hardship with medical records, check stubs, and whatever other documents that Discover may have requested. I was asked about my monthly income and rent payment to determine if I would prequalify/be eligible for the program. After I passed that step I was emailed the application and I filled out and submitted with the required check stubs the same day, only to be denied because my income to debt ratio was less than 60 % which disqualified me.

The only debt that was considered was my monthly rent ( though I have an abundance of federal student loans as well, a great portion of my check goes to a healthcare plan for my twin newborns, one of which has a neural tube defect, among other debt that I pay monthly ) and my income was considered with no regard to family size or the fact that I am the only source of income for my four member household which puts us a great deal under the median income for our location and family size. Additionally, if the only factors considered were my monthly income and rent payments, why was I not disqualified during the pre-qualification/eligibility stage while I was still on the phone? This could have saved me the time and hope that I put into filling out the application for no reason.

I say all of this to say that Discover has undoubtedly given us the run around with trying to give me options to make it possible to make payments on my student loan debt, all while ruining my credit in the process and making it hard for me to consolidate my loan with another company. I have been consistently in touch with Discover ever since I entered repayment in XX/XX/2017 until now trying to find a solution to be able to make consistent payments on my debt. I know for sure that my hardship was not investigated at all and that the documents I provided with my application were not looked at, as I called after receiving the denial letter only to be told that the information was run through a computer system and there wasn't a real person looking at the information or considering these approvals case by case. Discover 's action have been predatory at BEST and I am seeing an investigation into my situation to make way towards some sort of resolution.

Company response to consumer: Closed with explanation