Consumer complaint received 2018-09-24
Product: Student loan — Federal student loan servicing
Issue: Dealing with your lender or servicer — Received bad information about your loan
Company: AES/PHEAA (NY)

My student loans were consolidated in XX/XX/XXXX for the express purpose of getting on an income-based repayment ( IBR ) plan. I paid directly to the US Department of Education until my loan was transferred to XXXX in XXXX. In XXXX, my loan was transferred to XXXX, who I paid until my loan was transferred to XXXX in XX/XX/XXXX. On XX/XX/XXXX I received an acknowledgement from XXXX regarding my Employer Certification Form ( ECF ), and in doing so XXXX reported only XXXX qualifying payments from my qualifying employment begin date of XX/XX/XXXX, XXXX years earlier. 

I called XXXX and spoke to a customer service representative named XXXX and was then transferred to her supervisor named XXXX. The supervisor pulled up what records she had access to, and here is a summary of what we determined before the phone call ended : XXXX : 3 qualifying payments made in XXXX, XXXX, XXXX. The XXXX payment was outside window and so didnt qualify. She would have this payment reviewed. 

XXXX : XXXX, XXXX, XXXX, XXXX, XXXX, XXXX, XXXX, XXXX, XXXX had qualifying payments. No qualifying payment for XX/XX/XXXX due to administrative forbearance. No qualifying payment in XX/XX/XXXX. Supervisor reported she would have these payments reviewed as well. 

During our conversation, she was not sure why these payments that appeared to be qualifying were not treated as such. She mentioned something to the effect about my being in forbearance while I paid them. If I was in forbearance, why would I make payments? This response didnt make sense. She said something like, If you submitted payments under umbrella of forbearance, they dont qualify. You can request in writing to have the umbrella of forbearance removed so they do qualify. 

Satisfied that my payments from the beginning of my qualifying employment WERE indeed in their records, and that there seemed to be an easy process to rectify the situation, the phone call ended with the supervisors assurances my payments would be reviewed and I would hear the updated count on qualifying payments in about 60 days. Note that it took nearly 5 months for me to hear my original, inaccurate count from XXXX after being transferred to them. 

After more than 60 days of not hearing anything about an updated count, I called XXXX again. This time I was told that my case had been referred to the Dept. of Education who apparently is responsible for reviewing my qualifying payments and to continue waiting. It is now 8 months later, and I still havent heard anything. In sum, it has been 10 months since a review was promised, and 15 months since the original error in payment count was made. In short, my payments to all providers before being transferred to XXXX are not being counted/acknowledged as contributing towards my PSLF, despite being at the same employer ( professor at state college ) the entire time. I have always been in an income-based repayment plan. I want XXXX to acknowledge my payments to XXXX, XXXX and the US Dept of Education, and to receive an accurate, updated count of my payments toward PSLF.