I am so panicked right now! I sat down to pay the bills this morning and I always pay my DH's Sallie Mae loan every other payday. when I opened up the payment book I noticed that it still had November's payment stub still in it!!! I'm not sure where along the line I overlooked it because it's such a habit for me...but I did and now I'm not sure what to do. It was a totally honest mistake. If I mail it today, the city is fairly local so it would be there by Monday but yep, I'm technically 30 days late. How are they with reporting to the CR? And what are my options at this point? Do I wait and see what they report before I worry with a goodwill letter or should I go ahead and send one now? He's been paying this loan for 10 yrs (masters degree) and has never been late. I find it odd that we never got a phone call or letter or anything about it being late but anyways....

Help??
Thank you :-)

For student loans, there is no goodwill. Student loans are required by federal law to report 100% accurately to the credit bureaus, no exception. If you forgot to pay your husbands loan last month, your husbands CR will show a 30 day late.

The only thing you can, and the best thing you can do now is get the loan current.

Ugh - he's gonna kill me. We've worked so hard to get things in order since we had some financial problems 3 yrs ago with our son being sick but his student loans were never late. Nothing has been late since then and this was just a totally stupid mistake! I am so mad/upset/sick to my stomach.

Not quite true. I once had a situation with SallieMae where I sent a check but they never received it. Called the next month (after waiting to see if the check posted) and they said they would NOT report me as late unless I went further behind (90 days IIRC). Paid on the spot and signed up for online access/payment so it would never be an issue again.

Sure enough, they kept their word...no late reported.

So to the OP, I'd say: give SallieMae a call and talk to them about it. Make the payment ASAP.

I also had a situation where a rehabed SL was an auto deduct. Then apparently on the 10th month they stopped it and somehow I missed that. I called, they moved the pmt to the end of the loan, waived the fees and took off the late.

My 30 day late is 4 years old with Sallie Mae and they still won't remove it.

I work for a different lender than Sallie Mae, so I can't speak for that organization.

But if your husband were a client of my employer, I would tell you that IF THE LOAN IS STILL IN MORE THAN 30 DAYS PAST DUE STATUS, DON'T IMMEDIATELY PAY IT CURRENT. Instead, have your husband call and get a forbearance started.

At my employer, if we have reported you delinquent to the credit bureaus, and subsequently, we put a deferment or forbearance on the loan, made retroactive to cover the time period for which the delinquency was reported, our system will automatically (within 60 days) go back and remove the delinquency report.

But if the delinquency is reported, and then the account is paid current, then we would not change that delinquency report; it would remain on your husband's credit report for the statutory period.