Consumer complaint received 2022-03-23
Company: AES/PHEAA
State: MT
Product: Student loan
Sub-product: Federal student loan servicing
Issue: Dealing with your lender or servicer
Sub-issue: Trouble with how payments are being handled

Complaint:
My first loan through FedLoans was XX/XX/XXXX for my XXXX  degree. I subsequently took out a total of 5 loans throughout the course of my educational endeavor of varying amounts, keeping each to a minimum and my cost of living low. I was on loan forbearance while attending school, but did continue to make payments. I have worked for a non-profit in public service the entire time, including specific public service programs and qualified for the PSLF plan, submitting the appropriate paperwork. 

I have been meticulous in sending in my employment verification, adjusting my loan plans to match my qualifications for them. I did get a lot of conflicting information several times, even additional conflicting information even amongst supervisors and ultimately wrong plans which I had to change multiple times because they misinformed me several times, all of which caused a great deal of stress, but that's not my biggest complaint as grueling and frustrating that has always been. 

The main problem I face is that throughout the course, FedLoans has been making internal adjustments and losing my records, ones I faxed and received confirmation years ago for and none of what I have submitted thus far has been applied. 

In fact they told me XX/XX/XXXX that they did not have any of the documents I worked so hard to fill out appropriately, all this time I spend getting information and signatures from my employers, and they lost every single one of them. 

I even resubmitted an old document from XXXX and they could not find any documents that matched it because they literally lost every single document I have submitted thus far and never applied any of them in the real time, in which before the online tracker was viewable, I would receive confirmation faxes, emails, and made phone calls to ensure all was well trusting that all has been taken care of, applied, and completed on their end, now finding out none of this has been done. 

The online tracker says I have XXXX eligible payments needing employment verification ( only need XXXX to qualify for forgiveness or 10 years time ), which as I just stated I have submitted my proper documentation on a regular basis. 

And so I have since resubmitted everything through the course of my loan and nothing has been applied. 

I have contacted customer service after taking time off work to make phone calls and 2 of those days, the calls required me to be on hold for 6+ hours ( lost wages ). On top of that no representatives or supervisors know what to do about it. They can't even calculate it themselves. They can't even see how to apply it to reconcile my account. I've sent several emails. Responses are unhelpful, generic, often, autogenerated, often no reply at all. 

Instead they tell me to be patient which I have and so far no one as remedied the situation. 

As a borrower I am in good standing but I want to be complete in my end of contract and service with them but nothing is being done and nothing reflect even one thing of everything I have submitted thus far to meet the qualifications of the PSLF program which I am overdue for and have been for a while now.

I would appreciate any assistance you can provide me as they have poor record keeping, outright lost records, never recorded my accomplishments, communications, documents all along, didn't give me any updates, customer service is poor, they don't even know what to do and admit they don't know what to do except wait longer, wait longer, and they have yet to provide any appropriate updates as a business, no any answers or remedy for my situation after months of waiting, and actually years of waiting total since I was initially qualified for forgiveness. 

I would be due for a refund in this case based on the over payment calculations. And this is money that I don't have in my pocket that I could be applying to other areas of my life so I've lost time, money, and ground just on that which is incredibly disappointing and distressing. 

It should be remedied on my credit report, should say paid in full at this point so I can have that reflected in the other financial investments I want to make that I have had put on hold for a few years now, all because FedLoans can't maintain their ledger and have poor business practices as a student loan company and what should be a fair, transparent corporation with standards that would be up to par, a borrower contract and promise that they should have intention to keep properly and on time as they expect payments from me mutually, and a well-functioning business, but they have failed, greatly. And lastly I will say that this has been going on before the pandemic, so they can't blame it on that.

Company response to consumer: Closed with explanation