Consumer complaint received 2017-03-01
Product: Student loan — Federal student loan servicing
Issue: Dealing with my lender or servicer — Having problems with customer service
Company: National Student Debt Advisory Corp.

Complaint:
On my iPhone device, using XXXX browser I searched for " XXXX '' in XXXX Search. Several numbers came up for XXXX. They were in the form of a click-to-call. I called what I thought was a XXXX Student Debt Advisor ( SDA ). The man I spoke to was very knowledgeable about loans and the repayment process. He had no accent, spoke clearly, confidently and professionally. I asked to setup monthly payments. He gave me advice about how to handle my student loan debt., helped me set up direct deposit from bank acct., he gained access to my XXXX account. He told me that my loans were past due and that I needed to make a payment as soon as possible. He sent me an email with a service agreement to sign and another email with links requesting me to provide additional information. Please note, all emails and documents he sent were well polished and used legal terminology. When I did n't complete the request for information, he sent text message reminders to me. I tried to call XXXX directly to confirm whether or not this was a legitimate company, each time I called I would ask a XXXX representative if this SDA company was legitimate and the XXXX Rep sounded like they were new hires to XXXX, did n't know about XXXX enough to give me an answer and did n't seem concerned. They would put me on hold then transfer me to another XXXX Rep that was just as uninformed as the last. When I finally got ahold of a knowledgeable XXXX Rep they told me it was possible that this SDA company was fraudulent and had no record of all the times I had tried to contact XXXX directly. I asked the XXXX Rep who I needed to contact to report the fraud, the rep did n't know. XXXX never followed up with me to ensure my identity and sensitive information was safe or to check whether the fraud alert was taken care of. When I voiced my concern about a possible fraud on my account, we would get disconnected and XXXX never called back. When I did n't respond to the SDA " XXXX '' the supposed student debt advisor called my phone to remind me to complete the information so my loan would be paid on time and would n't acquire any late penalties. When I told him I did n't believe his company was legitimate, he had a supposed " manager '' call me and say that they were a partner company to XXXX and they were not sure why the XXXX representatives did n't confirm it. They told me they would call XXXX directly to work out the issues and call me back. Meanwhile, I finally got ahold of someone from XXXX, who was able to confirm that the SDA was not a legitimate company and referenced me to a place I could report it. Finally, 16 days later, I am able to provide a report on this illegal company called SDA. If XXXX Reps had been more knowledgeable when I first called, I would have been able to address this situation immediately. However, because it was so hard to get ahold of a knowledgeable person from XXXX, my information has now been compromised for the past 16 days.

Company public response: Company believes it acted appropriately as authorized by contract or law
Company response to consumer: Closed with monetary relief