Consumer complaint received 2017-07-17
Company: AES/PHEAA
State: PA
Product: Student loan
Sub-product: Federal student loan servicing
Issue: Incorrect information on your report
Sub-issue: Account status incorrect

Complaint:
The Cre  ditor American Education Services ( AES ) /AES PHEAA , and AES   XXXX   XXXX   XXXX   XXXX   XXXX   XXXX  , a student loan servicer continues to report inaccurate, incomplete and unverifiable information on my credit report. This has been going on since my Chapter  XXXX  Bankruptcy discharge in  XX/XX/XXXX . I have reached out to supervisors and managers of the company on multiple occasions in an attempt to resolve this matter. Please see attached supporting documents. The company serviced   XXXX   of my student loans prior to the filing of my bankruptcy, and refers to my account numbers as sequence numbers. My original account/sequence numbers end with  XXXX ,  XXXX  and  XXXX . After having filed a bankruptcy, AES set my account statuses as being in Default due to the filing of the bankruptcy. The company set my accounts as being in default not because the accounts were in default status before the bankruptcy filing but because the bankruptcy itself was filed. The accounts were actually in excellent standing. They were paid as agreed, never late and in either forbearance or deferred status prior to, throughout and after the bankruptcy filing and discharge. Then the accounts were transferred the company   XXXX   XXXX   XXXX   XXXX   XXXX   XXXX   XXXX  . This loan servicer ONLY services defaulted student loans in providing services in support of higher education finance. Thus, upon the discharge of my bankruptcy in  XX/XX/XXXX  and properly notifying  XX/XX/XXXX  about my bankruptcy discharge, the   XXXX   accounts were transferred from  XX/XX/XXXX  back to AES. Now, this is where the problem comes in. After AES repurchased my  XXXX  student loan accounts, ending in #  XXXX , #  XXXX  and #   XXXX  , from   XXXX   my accounts were supposed to be updated accordingly. In that,  XXXX  sent account numbers ending in #  XXXX  and #   XXXX    back to AES on XX/XX/XXXX . And, account #  XXXX  was repurchased by AES on  XX/XX/XXXX  since the loans were not in default on the date I filed bankruptcy. AES repurchased my student loans. Upon AES receiving the accounts, the company assigned new account numbers to each of the accounts. Supposedly, AES assigned new account numbers for the purpose of reporting updated, verifiable and complete information to the   XXXX   major credit reporting agencies. Also, the company claimed they were required to report the complete history of each account to the credit reporting agencies for the purpose of following the US Department of Education Guidelines, which are not FCRA laws. In either case, my account number ending in #  XXXX  was changed to #  XXXX  #   XXXX   was changed to #  XXXX , and #   XXXX   was changed to #  XXXX . To date, AES refuses to update the credit reporting status of the original account numbers #   XXXX  , #   XXXX  , and #   XXXX   to paid as agreed, never late/current and in either deferred or forbearance status since the accounts were not discharged in the bankruptcy. Furthermore, the accounts are in excellent standing and they the account statuses are supposed to revert back to the status that they were in prior to the filing of the bankruptcy. Instead, the company continues to report the duplicate accounts listed above, which has proven to confuse the credit reporting agencies and the AES employees until I thoroughly explain it to them. The company changes the new accounts that are supposed to report as positive accounts as negative accounts whenever they see fit. Other times, the company does not report   XXXX   or   XXXX   of my accounts to the credit reporting agencies when they should be reporting them. While other times, the company reports   XXXX   of the accounts   XXXX   times.   XXXX   of the accounts reporting as a positive, while the other identical account reporting as a negative. Then after I complain about the duplicate account the company removes the incorrect account from my credit report, which, depending on which day it is and who is responding to my credit dispute, my account will change to maybe a positive or negative status. And, this has to stop because it is against the credit reporting law, especially since it is a deliberate and unlawful fraudulent act. Finally, the duplicate credit reporting pulls my credit score down unnecessarily and has prevented me from obtaining job opportunities and mortgage loans. I expressed this to the company several times over, but the company refuses to update the original account numbers #  XXXX , #  XXXX , and #  XXXX  in their records to show current, paid as agreed, never late and in deferred or forbearance status. AES refuses to close the accounts out and/or delete them from their records in order to stop my credit report duplications. The managers in charge who have the authority to communicate with their Escalation department/section, which is responsible for responding to the disputes, refuse to learn about and train their credit reporting Escalation employees about credit reporting laws so that they will understand how to prevent the company from being sued for violating credit reporting laws. Thus, the companys telephone representatives blame the US Department of Education for them being required to abide by their guidelines. Therefore, I explained to AES that I have other student loans that are serviced by companies who also use the US Department of Ed Guidelines, but updated my student loan accounts correctly after my bankruptcy discharge and each of the student loan servicers did so without feeling the need to create new account numbers regardless of the status that my accounts were in. But still the company continues to report outdated, incomplete, and inaccurate information illegally, which is considered unfair credit reporting and therefore violates the Fair Credit Reporting Act ( FCRA ), and the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act ( DFA ), which was passed in  XX/XX/XXXX  to stop major financial institutions and creditors from continuing unfair practices  .

Company response to consumer: Closed with non-monetary relief