Consumer complaint received 2023-04-18
Company: Nelnet, Inc.
State: AZ
Product: Student loan
Sub-product: Private student loan
Issue: Incorrect information on your report
Sub-issue: Account status incorrect

Complaint:
I had a payment due to Firstmark Services, my private student loan company, on XX/XX/XXXX. I was unaware that I still had an outstanding balance because I had refinanced my loans and was under the impression that the entire balance was paid by the company I refinanced with, so I thought my account was closed. On XX/XX/XXXX, when I became aware that I had an outstanding balance, I made my payment of the original balance owed, {$94.00}, as well as a {$5.00} late fee, for a total payment of {$98.00}. I made this payment over the phone with a representative from XXXXXXXX XXXX XXXX  ( the bank affiliated with Firstmark ) who had called me to request the payment. I was told on that phone call that I had now made my last payment and that my account would be closed. This payment was taken from my bank account on XX/XX/XXXX. 

For the now over two months following my XX/XX/XXXX payment, I have continued to be told by Firstmark that I owed the payment and that my account was past due. My credit report did, and still does, reflect that this amount is past due, and as a result my credit scorXXXX has dropped around XXXX points in total. I have made several calls to Firstmark and XXXX XXXX XXXX and have spoken with several representatives to try to resolve this issue to no avail. I provided a highlighted bank statement to Firstmark to prove that I made my payment. When the payment was still showing past due, I called to follow-up and was told that the bank statement was not enough and that I needed to provide either a tracing number for the payment or a digital check. I called my bank and got the tracing number as there was no digital check for the transaction because it was made over the phone. I provided Firstmark with the tracing number. Yet again, I heard nothing from Firstmark and had to call to follow-up when I saw that the payment was still showing past due. During my follow-up call, I was told that the tracing number was not enough proof and that I needed to provide a digital check. I explained that my bank said there was no digital check and they asked me to call my bank back to try again to obtain the digital check. I called my bank and was told the same -- there are not digital checks for phone-initiated payments. When I informed Firstmark of this, a representative told me there was nothing more they could do to help me. I finally spoke to a supervisor and they said " the tracing number was enough '' to prove that I made the payment and that Firstmark must have mistakenly applied the payment to someone else 's account and that they would begin searching to see where the payment went. However, it is now over a week later and still there has been no movement on the process. I believe that they are now trying to work on resolving the issue, but it is unacceptable that it took so long for them to believe me and to take action. I have now spent hours on the phone over the course of weeks trying to resolve an issue that Firstmark caused by misapplying my funds. 

Some background information that I think is helpful to understand the very small amount of money that they are harassing me for : my original loan was for {$20000.00}, and with interest accrued, it ended up being around {$34000.00} that was paid to Firstmark. They are making this big deal over a {$94.00} payment -- less that 0.5 % of my total loan amount. 

I will say that most representatives I have spoken to have been friendly and tried to be helpful ; however, some of the reps have implied that I have lied about making my payment. I was also told by a supervisor that I made the payment through a collections agency ( XXXX ) and that it was XXXXXXXX XXXX fault the payment never made it through and I was told to call them about it -- XXXX had not spoken to me except once about a week prior when I informed them that I had made the payment to Firstmark on XX/XX/XXXX. 

I have been put through so much by Firstmark and have expended so much time and energy for something that was not my fault. I am starting to believe that this will never be resolved unless I make the payment again -- something that is completely unfair and I will not do.

Company response to consumer: Closed with explanation