Consumer complaint received 2021-06-29
Product: Student loan — Federal student loan servicing
Issue: Dealing with your lender or servicer — Trouble with how payments are being handled
Company: HEARTLAND PAYMENT SYSTEMS INC (MN)

I have been on an autopay plan with my XXXX loan servicer ( ECSI ) for years. ECSI offers a selection of calendar-based ( not due-date based ) payment dates : the XXXX, XXXX, XXXX, or XXXX. I had a previous experience with a late fee being charged when I had my payment date set to the XXXX ( my loan due date ) when the payment fell on a weekend, and although the servicer refunded that fee after several contacts with them and the school, I adjusted my payments to be withdrawn on the XXXX of the month prior to the due date to prevent this from happening again. 

Now, after at least 2 years of consistent monthly autopayments, my autopayment date again fell on a weekend XXXX Saturday, XX/XX/XXXX ), and ECSI processed it as of Monday XX/XX/XXXX. When I noticed the next payment ( XX/XX/XXXX ) had been allotted fully to principal instead of having a portion go to interest, I contacted ECSI to find out why, and they explained that it was because my XX/XX/XXXX payment processed on XX/XX/XXXX, after my monthly statement date of XX/XX/XXXX. What ECSI did not explain at this time was that because of this, they processed the XX/XX/XXXX payment as an overpayment, instead of applying it to my regular monthly payment due on XX/XX/XXXX. 

ECSI did not communicate that they processed my XX/XX/XXXX payment any differently than my usual monthly payments, and didn't provide any late payment warnings/notices. I only noticed they didn't apply my autopayment to my monthly payment due when I checked my payment history on XX/XX/XXXX, as I do with every payment, and noticed a late fee had been assessed. 

I contacted ECSI to get an explanation of why my autopayment wasn't applied toward my monthly payment as usual and ask to get the fee reversed, but ECSI claimed they couldn't answer questions about payment processing or due dates, and I would need to contact my lender ( University XXXX XXXX ). The University 's Office of Student Finance representative understood what had happened and sent a ticket to ECSI on XX/XX/XXXX requesting the fee to be reversed. 

On XX/XX/XXXX, having not seen the fee reversal noted in my ECSI account yet, I contacted ECSI to inquire about status and expected timeline of the ticket issued by my school/lender. ECSI acknowledged that they received the ticket on XX/XX/XXXX but it would take XXXX business days to process. 
I checked again on XX/XX/XXXX, and ECSI stated tickets take 5-10 business days to process. 
I checked again on XX/XX/XXXX. At this point, it was 11 business days after the ticket was issued/acknowledged as received by ECSI, and after I'd completed an ECSI survey about their live chat experience stating I didn't feel like my issue had been or would be resolved. ECSI stated that " the school never made a ticket ... '' At this point, my next monthly payment was due in 2 days ( XX/XX/XXXX ), and when I asked what I should do to get the accurate and updated loan amount prior to my payment while avoiding an additional late fee, ECSI vaguely responded that only the school can give permission for " that '' ( what? ) and you can follow up with them tomorrow. 

ECSI did not proactively disclose when processing autopayments in non-typical ways ( ie as an overpayment, rather than monthly payments as had been the case for multiple years prior ). ECSI didn't have the knowledge required to respond to loan processing questions or resolve issues and had to refer me to the lender for information. When the school/lender created a ticket for ECSI to resolve issues, ECSI lost/denied the ticket. Collectively, ECSI 's actions or lack of action caused fees to be incorrectly incurred, and made the resolution of those fees unreasonably difficult, including not responsibly handling tickets in a timely manner before additional fees would be incurred.