Consumer complaint received 2016-10-12
Product: Student loan — Federal student loan servicing
Issue: Can't repay my loan — Can't get flexible payment options
Company: AES/PHEAA (NY)

I called Fedloan to ask a question about an increase in my income based repayment ( IBR ). They informed me the increase was due to an increase in salary which I honestly did not realize because I was n't thinking of the tax year. The representative asked if I registered for PAY AS YOU EARN. I told her no only IBR, she told me she could help me fill out the paperwork. She told me to leave myfedloan.gov website and goto studentloans.gov. She assisted with the application. Well, what she failed to tell me was that this process removed me from my current IBR, where I was Paying approx. {$450.00} a month and it without my consent withdrew from my direct debit {$XXXX}. When I called informing them there must be a mistake, the representative did feel some remorse but told me there is nothing she can do. I asked to speak to a supervisor. The supervisor was completely unprofessional and rude. She conceded to the fact there is a flaw in the system and that I ca n't have my money back, she made this concession and offered to put me in forbearance for the next 4 month to balance out the debt fedloan put me in. I informed her that is not a good solution because I am a hard worker who has been regularly and routinely paying her loans to qualify for public loan forgiveness ( PLF ). A forbearance period increases the amount of time until my loans would be paid off. Well, Fedloan 's manager thought it was necessary to then tell me how it is my fault and that I did not know how to read because her representative does not have the application in front of her and she can not help me if I do not read it to her. I merely asked how a vital part of our education system can offer assistance but actually be unable to provide this assistance without the documents in front of them. This supervisor wanted to point the blame as if she had to worry about making her rent payment and bill payment, with {$1700.00} taken from her without her consent. She told me I can fight it with my bank, which I did. XXXX did return my money. The problem with this was that now I was in a situation where my fedloan balance was unpaid and at {$2200.00}. I called Fedloan asking to pay something. This representative was n't terrible but was n't correct either. She informed me that the ONLY way to pay that is in to ask for a one month reduced forbearance ( which is not a qualifying payment ) and in addition that would mean my repayment application would be resubmitted and in essence I would be in forbearance for 2- 3 more months. To give you an idea this started with my XXXX 2016 payment and I would in forbearance until XXXX. It was a lose, lose, I lost i am being punished. I am unable to make the qualifying payments for PLF because fedloan will not allow me to. The kicker came when I spoke to a lovely representative, XXXX. I called her on XXXX/XXXX/16 and asked why am I still in forbearance i was informed I would have a bill for XXXX. She informed me the end of XXXX. I am actually about to make the one month reduced payment of {$200.00}, which is non-qualifying payment for PLF. So at this exact point : XXXX, XXXX, XXXX, XXXX and now XXXX = 5 month of QUALIFYING PAYMENTS i was not allowed to make because of Fedloans system. Well XXXX, the 4th or 5th person was the first person to say this : Why did n't you just withdraw your PAY AS YOU EARN application, you could of been paying this whole time. I would thank XXXX for the remorse she showed and her solution, however, the damage has already been done. I have suffered the loss of making not one or two qualifying payment but i have been ridiculed and punished into the loss of 5 Qualifying payment for PLF. My debt is well over XXXX figures. If I had another option of a loan provider for loan forgiveness, I would change immediately based on the unprofessional, inaccurate guidance i received that will affect my life.