Consumer complaint received 2017-02-18
Product: Student loan — Federal student loan servicing
Issue: Dealing with my lender or servicer — Don't agree with fees charged
Company: Nelnet, Inc. (CA)

I have several subsidized and un-subsidized federal loans that are being serviced by NelNet at around XXXX ( now XXXX ). I have been on an Income-based repayment plan for several years now and have never missed a payment when one was due. This last year my monthly payments were {$0.00} because I was out of work and had returned to school. Typically, as has been the case in every previous year, I am required to submit documentation to NelNet so that they can reassess my finances to see what I can afford to pay for the following year. Typically this is completed in XXXX, a couple of weeks before the year ends. This year, since I was not working, it was n't as easy for me to come up with documentation to prove that I was n't making much money. I had started substitute teaching in XXXX and was only making a few hundred dollars a month. I submitted my documentation ( pay stubs ) in late XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX. Nelnet was unable to open the PDF 's because they were password protected, and they informed me on XXXX to let me know this. On XXXX I immediately resubmitted the same forms, only this time as a picture ( .png I believe. ) Over two weeks later, on XXXX, I received another emailing stating that they could n't open the .png pictures either. So on XXXX I resubmitted the documentation again. Then, two days later I received an email stating that my principal balance had been updated to reflect accrued interest being capitalized. This was {$10000.00} and apparently happens any time you have to change plans. When I called customer service I was directed to a supervisor who informed me that since they had notified me about submitting the documentation that there was nothing they could do about it. This is the part that is misleading. The supervisor told me that the due date had been XXXX. The last notice that I received that noted that date of XXXX was sent on XXXX. But, on XXXX, another email was sent and it informed me that I needed to submit my documentation by XXXX. To me that means that the XXXX due date is no longer in effect because a more recent email was sent and referenced a due date on XXXX. Since I initially submitted the documentation on XXXX ( which should still be within some kind of grace period even for the XXXX due date ) I believe it is a very harsh punishment to capitalize the interest. Now my debt looks worse to creditors and I 'll be accumulating more interest each year and I 'll have to pay interest on another XXXX once I am able to start earning decent wages. 
Nelnet 's methods of communicating are done with the guise of security ( they make you login to your account ( which no one wants to do ) just to read the fine-print messages that contain due dates, but then have no problem with disclosing how much interest has been capitalized directly in the body of a separate email. ) This seems incongruous. Should n't that be the other way around? Perhaps I am biased, but it seems intentional - as if they want you to turn in your documentation beyond their " due date '' so that the interest accrues. Sad to take advantage and punish people that are trying to better themselves with education. 

I 'm not sure, but I think this also might be viewed as a lapse in my income based repayment plan and I may lose those years that counted toward loan forgiveness. I also received a notice that my loan was approved for forbearance, but I never requested that. Maybe that is because I am back to paying {$0.00} per month but I did n't realize that was considered forbearance - I thought it was just based off of my income.