Consumer complaint received 2018-03-07
Product: Student loan — Federal student loan servicing
Issue: Struggling to repay your loan — Problem lowering your monthly payments
Company: Navient Solutions, LLC. (AZ)

I originally went through university of XXXX XXXX to get my XXXX degree. They were using XXXX XXXX originally as their loan service. I switched to XXXX XXXX for my XXXX and they were using the same. XXXX had me sign up for a private loan with out telling me why it was different and the financial adviser did not explain what the difference was between the two. 

That being said I had to stop going to school because I was told by the XXXX financial adviser that I had reached my financial aid cap for my degree and unless I could pay for it out of pocket I would not be able to get anymore student loans for my degree. So I stopped going to school and I was not making a lot of money ( barely 10 dollars an hour at the time ) and so I could not make the payments and my loans went into collections. Finally 2 years ago I was in a position where I was making more money and I was able to pay a little more. I was contacted by a loan collection company and they said they would take payments from me for 1 year and then transfer it to another company after the year. But If I made the payments for 1 year they would take my loan out of collections. 

I worked with them and payed them XXXX dollars a month for the solid year - they did transfer my loans away from them and unfortunately they went to Navient. I tried working with Navient ( they wanted XXXX a month from me ) I said I could not afford that and asked for an income driven payment plan. Other companies in the past had always taken into account not only what I was pulling in from my paychecks but how much my bills were that I had to pay for. Navient did not, they wanted a copy of my paystubb and when I also sent them an itemized breakdown of why I could only pay XXXX a month instead of XXXX a month, the representative on the phone promptly said that we don't take into account monthly expenses of what you have, all we do is see what you make and determine that you have to pay the amount you were told to. XXXX obviously is way to much with a mortgage, car payment and CC bills to pay as well. I advised them there was not a way I could pay for that amount and all i could afford was XXXX. The rep told me that if I didn't pay the amount that I was being told I had to pay then I would be getting negative reporting on my credit report and my option would be that I could put my loan into forbearance for a time until I can make the payment. Feeling I had no other option I put it into forbearance for a year ( its gaining more interest now, but what choice do I have ) and I am trying to figure out a way to get my loans away from Navient so I can actually pay them. I didn't get it out of collections just to put it back in. I want to make a payment however I don't want to send it to Navient because I have also seen on web and other peoples statements with their lawsuits that they conveniently lose payments or simply don't record them correctly. I seriously don't know what to do other than try to find a company that will take the loans away from them so I don't have to worry that my payments are going nowhere. I am hoping that If I get it to someone else I will be able to trust that my payments will be recorded correctly. I want to pay my student loans but I don't want to be paying so much that I am living paycheck to paycheck. I want to still be able to live comfortably and not have my credit dinged all the time.