Consumer complaint received 2016-03-11
Company: HEARTLAND PAYMENT SYSTEMS INC
State: TX
Product: Student loan
Sub-product: Federal student loan servicing
Issue: Dealing with my lender or servicer
Sub-issue: Trouble with how payments are handled

Complaint:
My university uses ECSI as a loan servicer. The servicer 's repayment process on their website is very difficult to navigate. I pay all of my bills online, including a student loan from a different servicer, and ECSI is the only one that I feel is intentionally trying to scam people into not making payments or being charged fees to make a payment. 

The whole issue with ECSI stems from having to navigate through a convoluted process to set up a payment schedule. In my situation, I attempted to make a payment several months before my deferment period was over. 

The process began like this : First, the option to make a payment was not given. After searching the site you figure out that you need to go through a separate process to add a checking account to your loan account so that the payment can be withdrawn from it. 

Second, once the checking account is added, you are given a few options to pay your loan i.e. via checking account, credit card, etc. A problem here is that XXXX of the payment options are identical except XXXX charges you a transaction fee while the other is free. These XXXX payment options both withdraw from your checking account. If you select the wrong option you may be directed to the process where you will need to pay a fee just to pay off your loan. 

Third, once you select the free option to pay by direct debit ( checking account ) you select your loan balance that you want the payment applied to. Here, I elected to make a {$700.00} payment. After inputting {$700.00}, you need to hit the " apply '' button. I think this button tells the system that you really do want to make a {$700.00} payment. 

Fourth, after you hit apply, you now need to check off on the boxes " below ''. Here, I agreed to the terms of use. Then I checked a second box where I was telling the system that I wanted my payment to be withdrawn/applied to my loan on a specific date and then selected the date I preferred. 

Fifth, I clicked confirm and received a confirmation page that my payment will be applied on the date selected. 

The problem arises in the fourth step. There 's another box that I needed to select. This box generally says that I would like my payment applied in periods of deferment or when payment is not required by me. So, even though I went through all of the steps telling the system I really want to make a payment and I want this payment applied on a particular day, none of it made any difference because I did n't select the XXXX box asking to apply payment when payment is not required. I even was taken to a confirmation page that showed my payment set up was a success but it never really was a " success '' because ECSI intentionally made the process convoluted. 

I was lucky to catch this during my deferment period. There has to be many situations where people paying off their student loans post-deferment encountered the difficulties of the ECSI payment process and ended up being slapped with late fees and such.

Company response to consumer: Closed with explanation