Consumer complaint received 2024-04-06
Product: Student loan — Federal student loan servicing
Issue: Dealing with your lender or servicer — Received bad information about your loan
Company: Maximus Federal Services, Inc. (NC)

This complaint ( with XXXX supporting documents ) is primarily against the Department of Education as they have the ultimate responsibility for the systemic mismanagement of student loans by their third-party student loan processing companies, such as : Aidvantage, and noncompliance with the Consumer Financial Protection Act and Data Protection Act for their deceptive practices, misinformation, disinformation, delayed information, data corruption, data loss, ill-trained support staff, dropped calls and long wait times, potentially incorrect loan terms/amount/account history and a flawed complaint process. These I believe to be a case for abuse of their powers and waste of tax payers money. 
It is impossible to keep track of historical and ongoing failures in the administration of the federal student loans. I am obligated to comply with ever changing rules, regulations and the Department of Educations guidelines, review my account, recertify, request advice on plans from ill-informed customer representatives and support teams, use flawed systems/interfaces/applications/processes, validate data accuracy, data completeness and report errors while The Education Department continues rewarding/renewing contracts with known bad actors such as : Aidvantage. 
Since XXXX, my loan account has been transferred to four different loan processors, and since XXXX ( post being advised to consolidate my XXXX loans into one ), I have spent hundreds of hours contacting my ever-changing loan processors and FSA/studentaid.gov support teams to resolve my XXXX  to Aidvantage account transfer related issues. For example : 1. Studentaid.gov still lists my IDR application as pending review status since XXXX when my consolidated loan was transferred to XXXX! 
2. Studentaid.gov does not list my IDR recertification application that was submitted via Aidvantage in XXXX of XXXX. 
3. XXXX recent statements from Aidvantage dated XX/XX/XXXX, and XX/XX/XXXX, list the maturity of my consolidated loan as XXXX and XXXX respectively! 
4. On XX/XX/XXXX, Aidvantage listed my IDR recertification date as XX/XX/XXXX, but on XX/XX/XXXX, it changed to XX/XX/XXXX. 
5. Studentaid.gov incorrectly lists XXXX and Aidvantage as my only XXXX loan processors - It is missing XXXX other loan processors : i ) from XXXX to XXXX, and ii ) from XXXX to XXXX. 
6. Studentaid.gov incorrectly lists start of my repayment history as XXXX and XX/XX/XXXX- It is missing my repayment history prior to XX/XX/XXXX- Please see my account statement from XXXX  XXXX, dated XX/XX/XXXX. V studentaid.gov repayment history large payments were made to all for loan accounts prior to XXXX, XXXX. 
7. My Aidvantage account terms and XXXX IDR recertification date keep on changing so I can't be sure of their accuracy. The terms and final repayment date of my current Aidvantage account are potentially incorrect as I believe my loan repayments had started in XXXX ( not XXXX ). The repayments for my first loan ( disbursed in XXXX ) started in XXXX since my son left XXXX without completing his XXXX degree in XXXX. Also, my repayments for the subsequent XXXX loans started in XXXX ( not XXXX ) post completion of my sons XXXX degree at XXXX. 
8. In XX/XX/XXXX, after submitting my ICR recertification and tax records via Aidvantage website. Aidvantage initially denied receiving it, then claimed it was incomplete ( only had my signature no other data ), and finally, admitted that my uploaded ICR application via aidvantage.com account website may have been corrupted during the upload process. The Aidvantage representative also said that they were aware of a system problem but did not yet know the cause. I was then asked to email my IDR recertification and tax records to the Aidvantage representative instead in order to expedite the recertification process! 
XXXX. During my loan consolidation process in XXXX, and transfer of my account from XXXX to XXXX, Aidvantage was designated as the transfer agent. Aidvantage attempted to illegally add fee/interest to my total loan balance - see attached loan breakdown before consolidation from XXXX XXXX XXXX consolidation summary from Aidvantage. It took multiple calls by me over several weeks to studentaid.gov, XXXX, XXXX and Aidvantage to get it corrected but no explanation was ever provided! However, Aidvantage representative claimed the Department of Education had approved the transfer fee charges! 
Also, please note that I have already submitted XXXX complaints ( unrelated to the above issues ) via studentaid.gov against Aidvantage/the Department of Education ) and the answer received from Aidvantage was wrong- see attached my email communication with the Aidvantage representative. 
The short summary of my initial XXXX complaints submitted via studentaid.gov is, as follows : - The Department of Education offered student loan holders the opportunity to : a ) change their existing loan processor ( only if they agreed to consolidate their loans ), and b ) use the consolidated loan to apply for an IDR plan to lower their repayments. In XXXX, I consolidated my XXXX loans, and selected XXXX as my new loan processor ( based on their good reputation in the industry ) and applied for the IDR plan via XXXX. 
However, soon after the consolidation and transfer of my loans to XXXX, they were transferred to another ll-reputed loan processor in XX/XX/XXXX, i.e., Aidvantage, by the Department of Education . I believe the transfer of my account from XXXX to Aidvantage was a ) deceptive, ) denied me the only chance to choose a reputable loan processor and c ) there are no references in my studentaid.gov account to XXXX as ever being one of my loan processors. 
- I followed The Department of Education guidelines and contacted my new loan processor ( Aidvantage ) for advice regarding the best repayment options for me. I was recommended to apply for the SAVE plan. I applied for the SAVE plan via studentaid.gov. However, the Department of Education through their third parties appeared to have either lost or misdirected my SAVE application and IRS tax record access authorization My application simply disappeared from my studentaid.gov account after several weeks- Please see IRS letter dated XX/XX/XXXX, confirming that my tax records were accessed by the U.S. Department of Education on XX/XX/XXXX. 
Furthermore, when I contacted Aidvantage, their representative a ) denied receiving my application, b ) stated and admitted I was wrongly advised by their own representative to apply for the SAVE plan, c ) informed me that I according to their records I was on a standard 10 year repayment plan ( not ICR ), d ) recommended that I should apply for ICR recertification. 
- I submitted a complaint via sutdentaid.gov but noticed that their complaint application process listed multiple entries for the same loan processors, and the final/summary page of the complaint ( before submission ), listed a different loan processor, i.e., XXXX, as my loan processor instead of Aidvantage! I reported the issue to the student.gov support team but during the transferr to a different department the call was dropped so I followed with a second complaint against Aidvantage as there are no options to file a complaint against the Department of Education via studentaid.gov. 
The XXXX closed unresolved complaints ( by Aidvantage ) that I have submitted via studentaid.gov are as follows : i. Case # XXXX - submitted XX/XX/XXXX. 
ii. Case # XXXX - submitted XX/XX/XXXX. 
According to Aidvantage representative : a ) my XXXX complaints were closed by them because they have no record of my SAVE application, b ) issues concerning studentaid.gov or missing records should be reported to studentaid.gov, c ) I should apply for IDR ( ICR ) recertification because according to their records, I was on a standard XXXX repayment plan ( not ICR ). However, she did agree with my concerns and confirmed sending my complaints to the FSA Ombudsman Group for their review/investigation- I can't be sure if FSA has conducted any investigation by contacting studentaid.gov and Aidvantage system support teams for potential software/interface bugs, conducting a rout cause analysis of my missing records, because : - Aidvantage representatives have provided me with false/incorrect information on multiple occasions : - FSA Ombudsman Group never contacted me - The Aidvantage representative assigned to my case no longer reply to my email- I have tried contacting the FSA Ombudsman Group on multiple occasions but all my calls to their phone line : XXXX were diverted to FSA XXXX then dropped or disconnected, with one exception. On XX/XX/XXXX, after calling the FSA Ombudsman Group six times and spending nearly 3 hours on the phone ( multiple dropped calls and transfers ), I was finally connected to a representative who claimed FSA had reviewed my complaints with an Aidvantage representative but could not provide me with any details as she did not have access to FSA Ombudsmans case comments. The representative then told me that I should expect a call from a supervisors within 1 to 2 days, and also, suggested that I could resubmit my complaints to Aidvantage via studentaid.gov! For the record, to-date, I have not been contacted by the FSA Ombudsman Group , and based on experience, I am very concerned about using studentaid.gov or Aidvantage.com to file a new complaint or apply/renew repayment plans until they can confirm the accuracy, security and privacy of my information held by the Department of Education and their third parties. 
Finally, please also note that I am retired U.S. citizen with a very limited retirement income my AGI for the years XXXX and XXXX were $ XXXX and {$13000.00}, respectively. I was advised by a XXXX representative to consolidate my XXXX loans. I did. I was advised by an XXXX representative to apply for ICR plan I did. I was by advised by an Aidvantage representative to apply for SAVE plan -I did. I was advised by an Aidvantage representative to apply for ICR plan - I did. What does the Department of Education suggest I should do next?