*Also posted in BK forum*

Hello All,

I'm new to the board and have a question regarding my BK that was discharged in March of this year. My husband (who filed with me), "attended" a university, however, he didn't complete the semester and as a result the school charged him back for the student loan money he'd been sent. Even after the BK, it's showing up as a collection and payable to the state's collection agency. Is this considered a student loan or just fees due to the university? Should this have been discharged or is it still collectable?

Thanks in advance for any help.

If DH attended a state university and withdrew, it sounds like the school sent back a portion of his sl funds. This is called a Title IV return and the school covers it with their own $$ and then attempts to collect from the student. It is not a student loan.

It is considered a debt to the state and probably not dischargeable in bk. I would check with your bk attorney. It sounds like it may have been sent to your state's attorney general or other state agency responsible for collecting state debts.

This seems to be a gray area. As snowpuppy mentioned it may depend on if DH attended a state school or a private university. You need to talk to your BK attorney. But, if they charged back the tuition - it seems to me it has nothing to do with student loans, it becomes simply tuition - and it could be discharged.

Having filed BK myself five years ago, I can tell you that I included a semesters tuition from a private university I attended for grad school, the tuition was fully dischaged.

However, one of my creditors was a credit union. I had taken a loan out from a CU and one of the many reasons I stated for needing the loan was to help pay back my student loans. At my Ch. 7 hearing the lawyer from the CU showed up and attempted to contest this on the grounds these funds were used for the purpose of paying student loans. My BK lawyer immediately asked me - did you use the loan to pay student loans? I said "NO", and my BK attorney said not to worry about it. The attorney for the CU went into my hearing and fought with me and the judge about this - but the Judge sided with me.

So in some cases, tuition may be discharged - however for the most part anything associated with student loans is automatically non-dischargable.

Good luck - I know how painful all of this is.

Including tuition from a private university is quite different from a state university. In most instances, state tuition is NOT discharged in BK.

The OP needs to contact her Bk attorney to be sure, but I'm willing to bet that this debt will still have to be paid.

Yes, and that was one of the first things I wrote in my post...which you didn't include in your "sound bite" version of my quote.

I wanted to bring to the OP (and other's) attention that YOUR situation involved a PRIVATE school. It does not sound as if his/her situation is exactly the same.

I didn't see the need to include in my quote anything else; my point was that state school tuition is different from private school tuition. There are going to be different rules for discharge in a BK.

Hi I'm new to this board. I have a question about the Private tuition you were able to include in your BK. I'm in a similiar situation. I have an old tuition bill about 6 yrs old from (private university) when I had to leave school when my mom was Ill. Consequently, she passed on and I still owe the money and can't get my transcripts so I can finish my degree. Anyway...I said all of that to ask: Were you able to get your transcripts from that school once you discharged the debt in BK? I'm presently at a loss of what to do to finish my degree. I'm currently employed in a Fed Gov't Coop job program and attending a school that was willing to conditionally admitted me with copies of non-official transcripts, but I've almost capped out of the Fed student loan program limits. That's how I"ve paid for the last few semesters. I don't have the cash to pay off the old tuition. So I can't afford to go back to school so that means I may have to leave the coop program. So not only am I looking at not finishing my education but unemployment. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks in advance.

honey

Yes, I was able to get my transcripts - although it wasn't easy. In order to get my transcripts I had get a "release" from the person who was in charge of BK and accounting in the university before I could order them.