Any experience with these guys? They pulled TU on me on 12/16 and I got my first dunning letter today they want 7k on an old, non government loan that was 4k. I sent out a validation request right away but I am stumped on what else to do.

Other than OPTING OUT and beginning to delete old addys from the three reports, I can't think of anything to do except wait.

Well, I would suggest that you get yourself ready to either set up a rehab repayment program or prepare to be garnished. I will never understand why people want to validate on a SL. Don't you think that the FEDERAL GOVERNMENT has the paperwork you signed?

You better start reading and reading fast. Because if you don't do something about this and face it head on, you're going to wish you had.

Best of luck to you.

Quilty:

SOL and Collections Practices Laws don't protect SL's? What set of laws govern SL's?

State SOL laws do not apply to federal student loans. They can and will and DO come after people 10, 15, 20 years and more after the loans have defaulted. Read here about people who have been garnished through Social Security. Or here about how someone's dealing with a 20 yr old SL.

This is why I am so vigilent in this forum; too often people think the same laws apply to SLs as those that apply to other debts; they don't. Misinformation is passed around and then before you know it, someone's here complaining about being garnished and/or their tax refunds being seized for old loans they thought were no longer collectible.

Truly, the federal government is NOT someone you want to mess around with; if you owe the money, pay it voluntarily. If you don't pay it voluntarily, you're going to get slammed, and it's going to end up costing you a lot more than you ever thought it would.

Quilty:

Thanks for the clarification. I will do what I can to make sure everyone understands that SOL, Validation, and collection efforts are different for SL's than consumer debt law and practices. Do you have a primer for SL credit repair?

I lived it. That's the primer.

Yeah, but I don't want to live it. How can I become better informed without jumping off the cliff?

Just like everything else you learn around here - read. I really can't give you the "quick" version. Dealing with SLs is a whole different ballgame. If you don't know what you're doing then you need to read up ... or let someone who does know what they're doing help if you're not sure.

Megan

We will need far more information than you have provided so far. What did the letter say?


fla-tan

"Non-government" can get a little wierd with SLs (like everything else with them!!). A loan can still be backed by the government, even if it was made by a seemingly private lender. Most SL lenders offer many different types of loans, some of which are really private and some of which aren't. This second group are part of what is called the "Federal Family Education Loan Program" or FFELP. All of your dealings would be with the private organization, but, ultimately, those are still part of the federal government. Just like loans that come directly through the state or through the U.S. Dept. of Education, these types of loans are not dischargeable in BK (except in VERY, VERY, VERY limited and RARE circumstances) and there's no statute of limitations on them. They also don't have to go to court to get a wage garnishment on them. Fun, isn't it!? Even loans that fit into that first group (the ones that really aren't backed by the federal government) aren't generally dischargeable in BK if they were made through a non-profit company. Often, even if the general company isn't non-profit, the arm that makes these types of loans is.

Hope this helps!! Like Fla-Tan said, with a little more info, we can give you more help -- most of us have been there!

Pavlov

I spent almost 10 years as both a FFELP and DOE collector and then 3 years as a Financial Aid Officer for a major University. There is no easy way to learn the ins and outs of financial aid lending and defaulting. There is an incredible amount of information to learn and the government is always changing and updating the laws and rules. Yes student loan collections is subject to FDCPA. But everything else about student loan collections is different. NO SOL. You can be garnished in ALL 50 states without a court order under the Adminstrative Wage Garnishment Program. They will seize your state and federal tax returns for non payment. Plus in extreme cases they will seize IRA's, homes,luxury cars and boats. It is next to impossible to get student loans discharged in BK...the BK courts not only look at what you are earning now but what you are capable of earning in the future.


Read this forum I believe will give you the best basics you can find. The DOE website also has some good basic information too.

Thanks. So for almost any SL, the access the CA is likely to have to documentation, original agreements, and potential garnishments is many levels above commercial debt collector's access to the same type of information? So the DV, wielded by an unsuspecting former student, can actually hasten a garnishment because of the ready access the CA has to original documents?

It seems that the commercial world of debt collectors end up passing around computer print outs when they purchase accounts from OC's and other CA's. The back up docs and original agreements rarely seem to follow the account itself. Here in the SL world, that is an essential difference with the commericial (CC's and auto loans, etc) CA market?

Is that close?

Document handling for student loans is highly regulated. The CA's get all their information via electronic transfers and the guarantor maintains all the back up documents. When I was collecting, I had access to the guarantors system and could print out complete loan history. Prom notes had to be requested from the guarantor and generally took about 2 weeks to receive. Technically a DV request could hasten a garnishment...I generally had about 2000 accounts in my que. Once a prom note and/or history was sent to a student we would be required to follow up on the account due to the DV restriction we had to put on the account while the notes were being requested. Often a DV request contained a new address for the student which would restart the due diligence cycle, which required that the collector maintain the account more closely.

Believe it or not, but mail from debtors was usually one of the best skip tracing tools we could receive! So many students like to use work envelopes with their employers names on it. Others would use the office mailing machine. I had a contact at Pitney Bowes and I could trace back the machine registration numbers!

Lynn:

Thanks much. This is starting to make a bit of sense. The SL world is SO different!

And as I was explaining to Pav last night in chat, the CA/guarantor does NOT NEED a judgment to garnish a check. So if one tries the DV route and then finds themselves the target of a garnishment order, there's really NOT a whole lot of recourse.

The only time I ever advocate sending a DV to anyone regarding a SL is if you're being dunned by more than one CA or if the balance seems so out of whack as to warrant a request for an accounting of the debt.

[quote name='TxQuiltGirl' date='Dec 20 2005, 07:14 PM' post='1175707']
[quote name='Pavlov' post='1175651' date='Dec 20 2005, 04:48 PM']
Quilty:

SOL and Collections Practices Laws don't protect SL's? What set of laws govern SL's?
[/quote]




Just to clear up the loan in question is NOT a federal loan. I believe they are after a private one drawn from US Bank. To my knowledge my mother paid it in full though when I was still in school, but since she is gone I have no way of finding out. Hence I asked for validation