Consumer complaint received 2025-11-17 00:00:00
Product: Student loan — Federal student loan servicing
Issue: Dealing with your lender or servicer — Received bad information about your loan
Company: Maximus Federal Services, Inc.
State: VA

Complaint narrative:
This is my second complaint to the CFPB about Aidvantage. It could easily be my tenth however, given how inept they have behaved and how frequently they fail to accomplish even the most mundane of loan services tasks.In this particular case, they had me refiling for income driven repayments which itself occurred because of the mass ineptitude or fraud on behalf of the DOE and/or the loan servicers to place people who did their due diligence into the correct plans. I did this, however, against my better judgement, knowing full well interacting with these loans at all was as effective as screaming into a XXXX hole. 

To my shock they actually managed to process my application- there is a first time for everything! But like everything else Aidvantage does, they elected to do this half way. They decided days after telling me I'd been approved for my IDR that only some of my loans had been applied to it. The letter did not specify why this was the case, and initially it seemed to be because some loans were still under a forbearance. The letter sent to me suggested that once these loans were out of forbearance they would be placed on the same IDR plan as all my other loans. It is important to note at this point that I am an older borrower and my loans have been on XXXX 's with no problems for years- it was only when Aidvantage took command of these loans that any problems occurred and then the current DOE chaos exasperated the issue. It turns out not all of my loans currently qualify for the plan I selected because of when they were dispersed. But neither the DOE nor Aidvantage did anything to inform me of this nor made any effort to tell me what steps to take. 

I did my due diligence by contacting Aidvantage to discuss my options, including other XXXX plans, and the possibility of direct loan consolidation. I did this through their chat service, speaking directly with a representative of Aidvantage. I am very delighted to show you how this conversation went, which I saved, and have only redacted personal information here for public display. 

XX/XX/year> * Borrower * has joined the chat Aidvantage XXXXXXXX XXXX  An agent will be with you shortly * Agent * has joined the chat * Agent XXXX XXXX XXXX  Thank you for using Aidvantage chat, my name is REDACTED. I'll be happy to help you locate information on your account by providing you links to the information. How can I assist you today? 
* BORROWER XXXX XXXX XXXX Hello. I believe the balance owed on my account to be incorrect and not reflective of my XXXX plan. 

AGENT XXXX XXXX To protect your information, will you verify your : Your full name Account number ( to find this, click the down arrow with your name on the right, select Profile and Show Full Number ) Date of Birth Telephone number on the account BORROWER XXXX AM Well I can do that but I'm not sure how that protects my information when I am logged in and can see all of that from my profile page. 
BORROWER has returned XXXXXXXX XXXX For your protection I can not discuss your account information without this information. Would you like a few minutes to find the information? 
BORROWER XXXXXXXX XXXX  REDACTED ( Here I gave the agent the requested information, with it active on my profile tab. ) XXXX XXXX  Thank you for verifying your account. By engaging in this chat, you consent to Aidvantage providing you with your personal and/or financial information within this chat session in order to assist you. Please give me a few minutes to research your account. 
XXXX has become idle XXXX XXXX XXXX  It's been a few minutes. Do you still want to chat with me? 
XXXX XXXXXXXX XXXX Yes. I'm waiting for you to finish your research. 
XXXX has returned XXXX has become idle XXXX XXXX XXXX  I'm showing some of your loans are on income based repayment, and some are on the level standard repayment plan. 

Borrower XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX They should all be on XXXX Borrower XXXX XXXX  They've all always been on an XXXX plan for years and years its only been recently, since Aidvantage took over and since the current administration, that there are constant issues. 
XXXX has become idle XXXX XXXX XXXX  Some of your loans are not eligible for the income based repayment plan, based on when the loan was disbursed. 
XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX  Are they eligible for any XXXX plan or is there a way to update them? 
XXXX has returned XXXX XXXX XXXX  No. You can look into other non income driven repayment plans. 

Borrower XXXX XXXX  For context everything was fine on an XXXX, then SAVE came out and I switched to SAVE, and then SAVE came under attack and its been constant having to update and reapply and just honestly insanity ever since. I appreciate your help on this I'm just trying to get to the bottom of it because a lot of people are not able to navigate this storm. 

Agent XXXX XXXX XXXX, or any combination which includes XXXX, applications are still paused due to the court injunction. 

XXXX XXXX XXXX  I can, but you can't tell me what those are? And apologies if I got this wrong but if a loan is outside the dispersal date aren't you able to consolidate it at the cost of resetting the forgiveness deadline? 

XXXX XXXX XXXX  You have options. Use this link to login to the XXXX Options on your account. https : XXXX XXXX has become idle XXXX XXXX XXXX  Your XXXX loans are not eligible for income driven repayment. 

XXXX XXXX XXXX  That is very interesting given they were on income driven repayment until last year... 
XXXX has returned XXXX XXXX XXXX  The rest of your loans are still on income driven repayment plan. 

Borrower XXXX XXXX  I think I have what I need here. Thank you for your time. 

END OF CHAT RECORDED Please note a few features of this conversation : XXXX. Aidvantage tries to play security theater - the system can't know my name, which it did, unless I was using this chat function while logged in. None the less, they pretend to be protecting my identity by asking that I verify identity information. Yet, that information is available to anyone who has logged in by clicking on profile. Not only does this protect no one, it creates a security risk by broadcasting the sensitive information over a chat window. 

XXXX. The chat agent starts out right away suggesting they'll just send me links before I even ask something. Notice that at no point in this chat do they direct me to anyone with more or better information. There is no reason to assume the chat agent isn't fully capable of discussing my loans and certainly not basic loan policy. This is important later. 

XXXX. The agent verifies they are capable of providing information by suggesting I just consented to them doing exactly that. They then say they will " research '' my account only to come back and ask if I still want to talk to them. This message XXXX be automated- if not the agent seems very confused as they seem to have forgotten what they just said to me. If it is an automated message, it shouldn't be. The agent doesn't acknowledge this either way. 

XXXX. Much of the conversation here is short, mundane, and useless. But the real serious problem comes when I ask directly about XXXX plans and loan consolidation. The agent says no, there are no XXXX plans or ways to update my loans to qualify for them. This means the agent is doing XXXX of XXXX things : a ) Willfully lying about my options. b ) Is so unqualified to be talking to me about this that they don't know they are giving false information while acting in the capacity of an agent of Aidvantage. We know without a doubt that Federal FELP loan consolidation is real, and does XXXX FELP loans access to more XXXX plans by making them Direct loans. We know there are other XXXX payment plans. The agent is either lying about this, or they don't know themselves and shouldn't be talking to people about their options. 

XXXX. To add to this terror, the agent doesn't seem to understand the difference between the terms XXXX and XXXX. I remind you that they represent themselves as an agent of a loan servicer qualified to talk to customers about their student loans and repayment options. XXXX, XXXX, and loan consolidation are basic concepts in the student financial aid industry. The building janitor is likely to know what they are. Yet this agent seems to be using XXXX and XXXX interchangeably not realizing they are different things. XXXX is a broad category and the other a specific plan. The agent doesn't seem to know about DOE loan consolidation at all. 

But I want it stated for the record that I do not believe this agent is completely at fault. I have removed their name here because I do not believe this agent should be penalized independently for what I believe to be Aidvantage not providing its agents any legitimate training, and that this is a larger symptom of a deeper, darker reality - that Aidvantage doesn't know what it is doing, is not actually capable of handling these accounts, and is entirely irresponsible and deficient in their duty while at the same time gaslighting borrowers into making them believe they are the irresponsible ones. My complaints are actually minor compared to many others who have experienced massive I'd argue fraudulent random changes on their accounts. Some have tried to pay the amount claimed to be owed only for Aidvantage to seem to " lose '' track of the money, or return it without applying it to the loan balance. Why would, why should, anyone pay money or interact with this company in any way when it is the equivalent of throwing your cash in a wood chipper and hoping no one throws the switch? I remind you none of us chose Aidvantage- we made a deal with the department of education and had Aidvantage thrust upon us. 

This company, indeed this department, is not qualified or capable of fairly and legally handling these accounts.

Company response to consumer: Closed with explanation