Consumer complaint received 2023-10-27
Company: MOHELA
State: NY
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:
I have been paying my monthly statement in full via XXXX XXXX since the day my loans went into repayment, initially through XXXX XXXX and for the past year and a half, through MOHELA. A somewhat separate but possibly related ( I don't know ) issue, I noticed that my loan status on XXXX has said " in forbearance '' for as long as I can remember - years - even though I have always been in repayment. I submitted an inquiry to StudentAid.gov and basically got nowhere - I got an automated message incorrectly asserting that I was inquiring about XXXX, which I wasn't. I called MOHELA, and they said it's probably a failure of data transmission between XXXX and MOHELA, and that I shouldn't worry, so I didn't. 

My main or more pressing concern ( maybe related, maybe not ), is that at some point in XXXX or XX/XX/XXXX, my repayment plan was switched from REPAYE to LEVEL, with no request on my part to do so, and with no notification from MOHELA that it was happening. I only found out about this when I got an email from MOHELA on XX/XX/XXXX saying that my Auto Debit had been suspended because " we have not heard from you. '' XXXX from me about what?? So I logged into the website to re-register for Auto Debit, which was inexplicably cancelled, and I see that my payment plan is LEVEL, which changed my monthly payment from {$520.00} to {$3600.00}. So I immediately called, waited on hold for over an hour, got nobody, and instead decided to just resubmit my XXXX request. It wasn't until XXXX that I received a correspondence via the message portal with a letter *dated* XX/XX/XXXX saying my new repayment plan was XXXX. Again, I made no such request. 

So I submitted my new XXXX request via XXXX, which was initially denied because I didn't submit my XXXX ( for the record, nowhere on the XXXX website XXXX it say I needed to submit additional documentation ). I got the denial letter on XX/XX/XXXX, and I immediately resubmitted my application, this time via MOHELA 's self-service option, with my XXXX. Then, just yesterday, XX/XX/XXXX, I got a notice saying I was placed on " administrative forbearance '' with no explanation as to what that is, or why it was happening. So I called MOHELA, waited on hold for literally XXXX hours, spoke with a customer service agent for another XXXX minutes, who proceeded to tell me that neither she nor any of her supervisors could explain to me why repayment plan changed, why my Auto Debit was suspended, and for how long I will be on " administrative forbearance. '' She did explain to me that this type of forbearance is for when they need more time to process a request. The problem is, any payments I make don't count toward PSLF while I'm in forbearance, and if I want to get out of forbearance, I need to pay {$3600.00} a month! All because of their inexplicable errors? And if this temporary forbearance expires ( in 30 days ) before they process my XXXX application, she said it's MY job to me to call them, wait on hold for XXXX hours, and ask them to extend the administrative forbearance. It doesn't automatically renew. 

This is incredibly unprofessional and unfair, and I just want to go back to paying my monthly payments like I had been doing for the past 6 years. Please advise me accordingly, thank you.

Company public response: Company believes it acted appropriately as authorized by contract or law
Company response to consumer: Closed with non-monetary relief