Consumer complaint received 2015-08-04
Product: Student loan — Non-federal student loan
Issue: Dealing with my lender or servicer — Received bad information about my loan
Company: Navient Solutions, LLC. (CA)

I have two issues. Issue # 1 is that their email billing is designed to cause you to incur late charges. They do n't send bills to your email until you are already overdue, and they have already charged you late fees. Apparently this is an issue with them, because they were legally compelled to send refunds of late fees last year. I 've had to request paper billing three times, and hopefully the girl I talked to today, XXXX, will actually follow through and make it happen. If they are going to make it so difficult to get onto paper billing, they should at least notify you of bills before they are overdue - it 's a total scam. 

Issue # 2 deals with my phone call with them today. I am currently unemployed. I called asking about forbearance. The gentleman I spoke with was not a XXXX XXXX speaker, which may have contributed to some confusion, but he lied to me and then attempted to enroll me into a monthly payment program without my knowing. 

When I asked about forbearance, he gave vague and conflicting information, telling me first that I had XXXX months total forbearance available, later telling me there was only XXXX months. Of course, it turns out there is up to XXXX months. 

He then told me that it would be better for me to pay the $ XXXX monthly payment in order to bring my account current, since forbearance would run out in XXXX anyway, and it would be better to retain the ability to use forbearance should I need to use it in the future. I agreed to making the payment now, and gave him my banking information. 

He then said he had to transfer me to an automated message which would explain the terms and conditions of the transaction, and that I should hit the # key after the message. As an aside, their message system has only the options to accept the terms and conditions or repeat the terms and conditions. What if you do n't accept, or got bad information ( like me ), and want to speak with the representative again? 

Eventually the system says that I had not hit a valid button within the time limit, and it transferred me back to the representative. Turns out that he was trying to enroll me into a monthly payment program, not take a one-time payment. I told him that was not what we had talked about and I was no longer comfortable dealing with him, then asked to be transferred to someone else. He kept trying to sell me, and I told him that I was not comfortable with him and that he could transfer me or I was going to call back and get someone else. He kept talking, and I told him I was not comfortable and hung up. 

After calling back, I got a girl named XXXX, and started the process over again. I got up to asking about forbearance, and she said she could enroll me in a program that would bring me current and yada yada yada, then paused, like someone was talking to her, then told me that, sure, she could arrange forbearance. She was helpful, and correctly informed me that private loans are subject to different conditions than federal loans, and explained that there is only XXXX months of forbearance available. She took my {$50.00} " good faith '' payment and told me the next payment would be due in XXXX, but that I can arrange forbearance again at that time. She also assured me that she would personally make sure that I received paper billing from now on.