A Complaint Letter That Got Results

Back in February we had a problem with our student loan servicer. We were enrolled in an automatic withdrawal program (which gave us a .25% reduction on the interest rate) and we were also eligible for a 1% reduction on the interest rate after 24 on time payments (which we would be assured of getting, since we were in the automatic withdrawal thing.)

We owe more on the student loans than we do on our house. That 1% is a big deal.

Our February payment never came out of the bank account. David called the student loan people about it twice – they kept telling him the payment had posted. Finally he got someone that told him it didn’t post because our bank account information changed. (It hadn’t). This took a couple of weeks. We finally just made a one-time electronic payment. Then we got a letter saying that our automatic payment didn’t go through; this letter was more than 2 weeks after the payment was due, nice timing. THEN we got a letter saying that since our payment was more than 15 days late, we were no longer eligible for that 24 month 1% reduction thing.

I was pissed. I wrote a long letter detailing everything that had happened, saying that they couldn’t even tell us what had happened with our bank account, and that we wouldn’t have known anything was wrong if we hadn’t called them because the letter they sent came so late. I said "It seems to me that you are making sure that I do not qualify for this incentive program."

Today I got a letter saying "This is to inform you that your account is once again eligible for the on time incentive plan offered by your lender."

Woohoo!