Date Received: 2023-04-06
Issue: Dealing with your lender or servicer
Subissue: Trouble with how payments are being handled
Consumer Complaint: On XX/XX/XXXX, I filed Complaint # XXXX regarding an issue with refunding student loans paid during the COVID-19 forbearance period. I filed the complaint against my prior servicer, XXXX XXXX, who responded that they were not responsible for my refund and the case was closed on XX/XX/XXXX, seemingly without anyone from the CFPB reading my complaint or the response. Request was made on XX/XX/XXXX with XXXX to refund all student loans paid during COVID-19 forbearance period ( XXXX XXXX ). Call reference number was # XXXX. I was advised on a call two months later that I would not be able to get my student loans refunded because I paid select loan sequences in full, which I later learned was a false statement. In XX/XX/XXXX I learn that my loans are being transferred to Mohela and received an email on XX/XX/XXXX that the transfer process had began. On XX/XX/XXXX, I saw that my account had now reflected my current balance and contacted Mohela to initiate the refund process. I was told it would take 60 days. I called several times over the course of 60 days for updates, and never received any update. After 60 days, I called Mohela and was advised that the wait would now be 90 days following the influx of forgiveness applications from late XXXX following the President 's executive order. Called after 90 days from original request ( late XX/XX/XXXX ) and told loans were still in process. Was just advised today by a supervisor after being on hold for two hours and forty-five minutes that Mohela could not initiate the refund request because the loans were paid off through XXXX, not Mohela. This was the first time I received this information despite calling well over twenty times since original request was made on XX/XX/XXXX. I was directed to call XXXX. I contacted XXXX three times today, XX/XX/XXXX, and each time I call, I receive an automated response that my loans were transferred to Mohela, and I can press zero for further guidance. All three times the call was dropped. I filed the complaint with CFPB # XXXX and XXXX responded that this was Mohela 's XXXX, but Mohela claims the loans were paid off while they were serviced with XXXX, so Mohela isn't responsible. On XX/XX/XXXX, I filed complaint # XXXX against Mohela upon learning that Mohela was indeed responsible for initiating the refund request as my new servicer. On XX/XX/XXXX, Mohela responded to the CFPB complaint advising that my refund request had been processed as of XX/XX/XXXX. IT IS NOW XX/XX/XXXX, AND I HAVE YET TO RECEIVE MY COVID-19 REFUND. Upon investigation from the Department of Education OMBUDSMAN, I learned today that the Department of Treasury has been ready to issue payment for 60 days but has yet to receive information requested from Mohela. That is completely unacceptable and Mohela must be held accountable for its gross failure in handling this matter for the past 9 months.
Company Response: Company believes it acted appropriately as authorized by contract or law
State: NJ
Zip: 08831
Submitted Via: Web
Date Sent: 2023-04-06
Company Response to Consumer: Closed with explanation
Timely Response: Yes
Consumer Disputed: N/A
Date Received: 2023-04-06
Issue: Problem with a credit reporting company's investigation into an existing problem
Subissue: Their investigation did not fix an error on your report
Consumer Complaint: On XX/XX/XXXX, and XX/XX/XXXX, I received an email and letter from the Department of Education. In regards to, Student Loan Discharge Based on Borrower Defense Evidence. The notice from the Department of Education stated, " Your loan ( s ) will be discharged as part of a Department action ( " Group Discharge '' ) to discharge all outstanding loans for attendance at XXXX XXXX XXXX that first began from XX/XX/XXXX through closure in XX/XX/XXXX after finding that it engaged in widespread misconduct that violated state consumer protection laws and/or made widespread substantial misrepresentations about its educational programs, both of which are grounds for borrower defense to repayment under the borrower defense regulations ( 34 C.F.R. 685.206 and/or 685.222 ). The Department is discharging your loans without requiring you to file an application because of the pervasive and widespread nature of the school 's conduct. You also may receive a refund for prior payments made to the Department on your discharged loan ( s ) related to XXXX XXXX XXXX. Your servicer will let you know if you are eligible for a payment refund, which would be mailed to you. Please check your online account with your loan servicer to ensure your address is correct so you can receive any refund. Otherwise, you do not have to take any further action to receive your discharge. Your credit report will also be updated to reflect this discharge when it is complete. '' I have previously disputed with all credit bureaus and the issue has failed to be resolved. I contacted the loan servicer MOHELA after receiving written notice and was advised it will be removed in 90 days. This was not resolved.
Company Response: Company believes it acted appropriately as authorized by contract or law
State: VA
Zip: 23321
Submitted Via: Web
Date Sent: 2023-04-06
Company Response to Consumer: Closed with monetary relief
Timely Response: Yes
Consumer Disputed: N/A
Date Received: 2023-04-06
Issue: Dealing with your lender or servicer
Subissue: Trouble with how payments are being handled
Consumer Complaint: I called XXXX on Friday XX/XX/XXXX to make a {$240.00} payment over the phone to be applied to the principal on the loan I have with XXXX. XXXX is related to Mohela and the person who processed my payment applied it to Mohela loans. When I called this morning to get that corrected, I was told that because Mohela and XXXX are separate entities, they couldn't apply the payment that was incorrectly made to Mohela to the XXXX loan. In addition, I was told that it takes 60-90 days to refund a payment. I understand that being separate entities makes it not possible to do that. Ok, fine. I get it but 60-90 days, 2-3 months to get a refund for a mistake XXXX made on their end, I can't accept that. I am trying to get ahead here. Making extra payments before the program even ends to get ahead. This should be something that can be done online on the XXXX portal but I have to call the loan servicer to make that happen? I had called early XXXX for the same thing and that payment didn't go towards the principal like I asked. It shouldn't be this hard and painful to make student loan payments.
Company Response: Company believes it acted appropriately as authorized by contract or law
State: CA
Zip: 91331
Submitted Via: Web
Date Sent: 2023-04-06
Company Response to Consumer: Closed with explanation
Timely Response: Yes
Consumer Disputed: N/A
Date Received: 2023-04-05
Issue: Incorrect information on your report
Subissue: Account information incorrect
Consumer Complaint: My loan with Mohela/DoFed is showing a balance of {$58000.00}. My balance is actually {$0.00}. That needs to be updated asap.
Company Response: Company believes it acted appropriately as authorized by contract or law
State: NC
Zip: 27262
Submitted Via: Web
Date Sent: 2023-04-05
Company Response to Consumer: Closed with explanation
Timely Response: Yes
Consumer Disputed: N/A
Date Received: 2023-04-05
Issue: Dealing with your lender or servicer
Subissue: Trouble with how payments are being handled
Consumer Complaint: Mohela, as the federal student loan servicing contractor, essentially scammed me. Their staff encouraged me in XX/XX/2022 to request a refund of my XXXX forbearance payments made to the prior loan servicer, promising me the US Treasury would refund me approximately {$15000.00} in total. However, that never was requested of the Treasury, or Mohela prevented the refunds from being made. Either the request to make the refunds was not sent to the Treasury, or Mohela misrepresented their intent, and changed my zip code from a Texas zip code to a DC area zip code, as they later claimed the Treasury issued me a check for about half the total, but it was returned due to an incorrect address. My address was correct up until that time, but someone changed the Texas address to a DC zip code in ED records. After taking some time to correct that, no action has occurred, and I keep being told that refunds will be requested. In the interim, Mohela processed a loan consolidation request I made months later, and processed the new loan as if I had received the full amount of the refunds. So, the consolidation loan total is over {$30000.00} instead of close to {$15000.00}, which was the remaining balance after the forbearance payments. Mohela has committed fraud and theft by essentially promising the refunds, acting like they were made prior to consolidating the loans, and somewhere pocketing the approximately {$15000.00} I already paid. I did tell Mohela that instead of the refunds, they could just correctly make the consolidated loan balance around the {$15000.00} total loan balance it was before the consolidation was processed, but they have refused. So, I have made about {$15000.00} in education loan payments that have just vanished into thin air.
Company Response: Company believes it acted appropriately as authorized by contract or law
State: TX
Zip: 78660
Submitted Via: Web
Date Sent: 2023-04-05
Company Response to Consumer: Closed with monetary relief
Timely Response: Yes
Consumer Disputed: N/A
Date Received: 2023-04-05
Issue: Dealing with your lender or servicer
Subissue: Received bad information about your loan
Consumer Complaint: This is about loan forgiveness. I applied for TPSLF/PSLF long before XX/XX/2022 ( in the summer ). I was with XXXX and then was transferred to Mohela after I had already met the 120 qualifying payments ( I actually have over 140 qualifying payments as shown on the Mohela site and confirmed by two different customer service agents when I called during summer, during fall and now during spring ). When I called Mohela the first time in XXXX, I asked how long it would take for forgiveness since I had met the requirements for the XXXX in the summer and before being transferred. I was told then that it would take 90 business days after Mohela verified the 120 qualifying payments. It had been over 90 business days. I then received an email from Mohela in XXXX that one of my TPSLF/PSLF was denied because it was not signed. I uploaded the correctly signed form again because apparently XXXX might not have sent the corrected form, even though the issue had already been resolved when I uploaded the correctly signed document in the summer. I called Mohela and was told that uploading the form was not necessary and that my information was already forwarded to XXXX XXXX XXXX for verification and forgiveness, which would take 90 business days. I called Mohela at the of XXXX to ask about progress. I was then told that XXXX began the 90 business days because of the same form that had already been addressed in the summer and again in XXXX. I have been lied to and misdirected. I am sick and tired of dealing with incompetence. I want action now. I did what was supposed to do. I want Mohela to do what they are supposed to do.
Company Response: Company believes it acted appropriately as authorized by contract or law
State: TX
Zip: 762XX
Submitted Via: Web
Date Sent: 2023-04-05
Company Response to Consumer: Closed with explanation
Timely Response: Yes
Consumer Disputed: N/A
Date Received: 2023-04-05
Issue: Dealing with your lender or servicer
Subissue: Received bad information about your loan
Consumer Complaint: During the Covid 19 pandemic, I paid my student loans, thinking that I was doing the right thing and mature thing in order to pay them down. I later learned about the public service loan forgiveness program, and the waiver that they had, and in order to get my counts to where I needed it to be I needed to consolidate my loan, so I went ahead and consolidated my loan as I was told to do. In the process I was at no time informed that after consolidating, I would not be able to get my COVID-19 payments back. On the website it specifically states that if you pay during COVID-19 you can request the money back it does not say anywhere that you can not get the payments once consolidated unless you look specifically under the Biden plan which has nothing to do with what I am discussing. There is also nothing under the consolidation portion, indicating that if you consolidate, you are not going to be able to get the COVID-19 payments back. At no point during the process did anyone tell me or warn me that this was going to occur. I am now losing out on thousands of dollars that I paid that I should be able to get back all because I consolidated my loan. Had I not consolidated I wouldve been able to get the money back. There is no difference in the consolidation or non-consolidation as far as me getting the money.
Company Response: Company believes it acted appropriately as authorized by contract or law
State: MO
Zip: 63376
Submitted Via: Web
Date Sent: 2023-04-05
Company Response to Consumer: Closed with explanation
Timely Response: Yes
Consumer Disputed: N/A
Date Received: 2023-04-05
Issue: Incorrect information on your report
Subissue: Account status incorrect
Consumer Complaint: My Federal student loans, serviced by Mohela/Department of Ed have been paid off for months. My bank, XXXX, and the XXXX, show the student loan account as still open with a ~ {$520000.00} balance owed. This error substantially impacts my credit score. Banks sharply limit a potential home loan because this student loan appears open on my credit report. The fact that it takes months and months for this to be corrected is completely unacceptable and the error itself is costing me money. Credit reporting agencies should not be able to hold one 's credit report hostage like this. To boot, XXXX is difficult to get ahold.
Company Response: Company believes it acted appropriately as authorized by contract or law
State: NY
Zip: 10708
Submitted Via: Web
Date Sent: 2023-05-02
Company Response to Consumer: Closed with explanation
Timely Response: Yes
Consumer Disputed: N/A
Date Received: 2023-04-05
Issue: Dealing with your lender or servicer
Subissue: Received bad information about your loan
Consumer Complaint: I believe Mohela has mishandled my student loans and my eligibility for the Public Service Loan Forgiveness Program. They have erroneously denied and/or processed my PSLF application incorrectly. An application was sent to Mohela on XX/XX/XXXX certifying all my employment. Mohela is not even processing my PSLF application. They closed it as a duplicate however the only other application on file is listed as cancelled. There isnt a duplicate or at least an approved XXXX so this pushes the processing time even further due to their mistake.
Company Response: Company believes it acted appropriately as authorized by contract or law
State: CO
Zip: 80524
Submitted Via: Web
Date Sent: 2023-04-05
Company Response to Consumer: Closed with non-monetary relief
Timely Response: Yes
Consumer Disputed: N/A
Date Received: 2023-04-05
Issue: Incorrect information on your report
Subissue: Account status incorrect
Consumer Complaint: Mohela Student Loan Servicing apparently sent me a letter in XX/XX/XXXX that included how much I had paid on student loans in XXXX for use when filing taxes. The Post Office failed to deliver my letter and returned it to Mohela. Mohela retains all contact info such as phone number/ text number, email address, and mailing address. Mohela verifies this info every time you contact them. Mohela reported to the credit bureaus that they were unable to reach me at my address. This contact caused the credit bureaus to reduce my credit score by XXXX points. Like many people, I have spent years establishing a high credit score by no lte payment, no missed payments, and maintaining a low credit usage. Now, years of work is down the drain due to a mailing error? made repeated calls to Mohela and was placed on hold for approx 1 hour to get excuses. They have no process in place to try to contact anyone by alternate means when a letter is misdelivered or returned. This is unacceptable and they refuse to help or to put me in contact with someone who has actual ability to address the issue.
Company Response: Company believes it acted appropriately as authorized by contract or law
State: CA
Zip: 90604
Submitted Via: Web
Date Sent: 2023-04-05
Company Response to Consumer: Closed with explanation
Timely Response: Yes
Consumer Disputed: N/A