Consumer complaint received 2016-03-08
Product: Student loan — Federal student loan servicing
Issue: Dealing with my lender or servicer — Trouble with how payments are handled
Company: Performant Financial Corporation (CA)

Complaint:
In XXXX XXXX, I entered into a Loan Rehabilitation program for my defaulted student loan with Performant Inc. collection agency. It is a 10 month program, in which I needed to make 9 on time payments. My payments were set up as recurring auto payments to my checking account. The withdraws showed up as electronic checks. Based on the ( many ) financial disclosures I submitted, my monthly income, last year taxes, my monthly bills, etc. my payments were set by Performant Inc. at {$76.00} a month. At the beginning of XXXX XXXX, I get a call from Performant Inc. that they are going through an audit of their accounts and my monthly payments had changed. I was informed that my monthly payments were going to be {$33.00} a month for the remaining 10 months which was scheduled to end in XXXX XXXX. 
In the mail I received monthly statements, the statements still had the {$76.00} due on it. On XXXX XXXX, XXXX, I called XXXX XXXX to ask about the conflicting info on my statements. I was told by Performant Inc. that my last two payments for XXXX XXXX and XXXX XXXX, did not go through and was declined because of inefficient funds. I knew this was not true because I had been very careful in budgeting myself and making sure I always had enough money in my account. I panicked!!! Because if you miss a payment you get kicked out of the program. 

I called my bank to see if there was any trace of these automatic withdraws going through to my account? My bank said " No ''. They confirmed that my checking account never went below {$300.00} in XXXX and XXXX. The money was there and NO attempt to withdraw funds from Performant Inc. I called back Performant and left a message what my bank told me and that I can get a statement from my bank to confirm this info. I spent all day calling Performant every hour to get hold of a " live '' human being to fix this problem. XXXX XXXX XXXX I called again and spoke to a person at Performant and told him what was going on and I also asked why Performant did n't notify me the payments were not going through???? He said, " that Performant did call, but did not leave a message '' So, If I did n't call about the incorrect statements in the first place, I would have never know there was something " wrong '' with my account!!!??? 
I asked if I can make the back payments and current payment that day to correct this? Performant said they can not go back into the program and change it. That I had to start the whole process over from the beginning! 
I want to clarify, I did not do anything wrong. It was Performant Inc. that either has my checking account # wrong or something other reason why they are not withdrawing my monthly payment. 
the rest of Friday, XXXX I had to dig out all of my financial statements, pay stubs, fill out there forms and fax it to them .... there was some problem on Performant Inc. end they kept cutting off the papers I was trying to fax to them. I could only send XXXX pages at a time?? I finally got everything to them. ( also, I asked numerous times to check that they had the correct checking account #. They told me they could not access that info. 
Bottom line : I was half way through the Loan Rehabilitation program and now because of Performant Inc. " mistake '' I have to restart the whole program from the beginning ... another 10 months. Also, I submitted all the same info and paperwork as before ... ... and my monthly payments went UP from {$33.00} a month to {$94.00} a month???

Company public response: Company has responded to the consumer and the CFPB and chooses not to provide a public response
Company response to consumer: Closed with explanation