When you borrow from a bank where you also keep your day-to-day cash, you might be opening yourself up to problems down the line. Most banks have a right of setoff, which means they can tap other accounts you hold with them to repay themselves money you owe. For a woman in Atlanta, this meant Wells Fargo legally drained her checking account without warning, leaving her and her husband with no cash and $385 in overdraft fees, due to some ongoing confusion over a student loan. [More]
student loans
Citibank Helpfully Sends $0.00 Collection Letter
By 4.9.10
Citibank is so funny! They sent G. a prank collection letter for her student loan. Even though she doesn’t owe a balance. Hehe! April Fool! [More]
New Law: All Students To Borrow Directly From Federal Government
By 3.30.10
President Obama signed the last piece of the health care legislation today — but it wasn’t actually health care legislation — it was, instead, an overhaul of the federal student lending operation. All students getting federal student aid will now borrow directly from the federal government instead of sometimes having to go through a subsidized private lender. [More]
Where People Pay $30k A Year To Make $10 An Hour
By 3.13.10
The New York Times takes a look at one dubious beneficiary of the recession, the for-profit trade school. These places offer training in fields like health care, computers and food service …and enrollment is soaring. [More]
Sallie Mae's Customer Advocate Unit Makes Up For Regular Customer Service
By 3.10.10
Jen wrote to Consumerist to let us know that the number we posted in August for student loan servier Sallie Mae’s Customer Advocate Unit is still valid and staffed with extremely helpful people.. She cut through the nonsense of regular customer service who were unable to help, then hung up on her. [More]
Buy A Georgetown Law Degree On Craigslist
By 3.1.10
Mom and Dad always wanted you to be a lawyer but who wants to dump all that money down the tubes and read those boring books? Well, no longer! Some burnout is selling his law degree from a fancy university on Craigslist! [More]
Don't Sign Your Soul Over To Student Loan Debt
By 2.13.10
Welcome to the American Dream. To follow that dream, you borrow heavily to get the education you need for your chosen career, in the mistaken belief that you will be able to get a better-paying job in that career once your education is completed, and repay the loans. Borrowing the money for education isn’t always an investment in yourself–often, it’s committing yourself to decades of commitment to a debt that is difficult to discharge or negotiate when you encounter a bad job market or other hard times. [More]
Financial Advice For College Students
By 9.14.09
The San Jose Mercury News has compiled a list of financial tips for people just entering college. These are the sorts of things that will help you avoid racking up huge debts or wasting money you don’t have on fees and penalties—and of course they can apply to pretty much anyone, not just college students.
Reach Sallie Mae's Customer Advocate Unit
By 8.13.09
Are you getting nowhere with the usual channels at Sallie Mae? Here’s how you can reach their Customer Advocate Unit, a charming oasis of competence and politeness.
Credit Unions Dive Into The Student Loan Market
By 8.9.09
Private loans are the worst type of student debt, but the best place to get them may be your local credit union. Like most credit union products, their loans are usually a better deal with more favorable terms than similar loans from bigger banks.
By 7.3.09
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Robert Bowman graduated from college and law school despite great adversity, and passed the New York bar exam on his fourth try. Now, the state bar association refuses to admit him because of his substantial student loan debt. You know, instead of letting him practice law so he can pay it off. Disturbing, and a cautionary tale: just because your student loan company isn’t sending you letters, that doesn’t mean they aren’t charging you fees. [New York Times]
Save On Federal Student Loans July 1
By 6.4.09
If you have a bunch of variable rate Federal student loans, July 1st could be your lucky day. July 1st is when the interest rates on Federal student loans changes, and one financial id expert is predicting they’re going to drop to “historic lows.” What this means is you will have an opportunity to consolidate your variable rate Federal student loans together at the new, lower, rate, and save yourself some cash. How much?
Costly Private Loans Masquerade As Federal Student Loans
By 5.22.09
Some students who didn’t read the fine print are finding out too late that what they thought were federal student loans were actually private loans. The mistake is the difference between a 6% and 18% interest rate.
HSBC Canceled My Card Due To Inactivity And Ruined My FICO Score!
By 4.22.09
Reader Travis recently found out that one of his oldest cards had been canceled due to inactivity. This caused quite a dent in his FICO score and he’s about to go shopping for student loans— so he’s understandably freaking out.
By 4.6.09
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Sallie Mae is going to “reverse outsource” and move 2,000 jobs from overseas back to the US in order to get people, (the president?) to like them again. Will it work? HAHAHHAHAHA. Oh, sorry. That was unprofessional. [Reuters]
A Big-Ass List Of Student Loan Resources
By 3.30.09
It’s a tough economic climate to be graduating from school — and maybe an even tougher one for those of you trying to get financial aid. We’ve put together a list of some financial aid and student lending resources to help make things easier.
Citibank Won't Accept The Extra Money You Sent To Payoff Your Student Loans
By 3.28.09
We’re all about to see more money in our paychecks thanks to lower payroll taxes, but if you want to use the savings to payoff your student loans, you better act on the one day that Citibank will take your money. At least that’s what Citibank told reader Valori, who tried sending the bank a check with instructions to apply it towards the principal on her student loans. The bank instead applied it to her usual monthly payment and told her that the only way to pay down her principal was to “setup an automatic payment on the Citibank website to debit on the same day as [the] automatic payment is direct debited.” Does that seem easy to anyone?
Stock Market Pleased By New Phase Of Bailout
By 11.25.08
Today the Federal Reserve announced the creation of a new special purpose entity that will buy consumer and business debt. Under the new plan, the Treasury will provide $20 billion dollars in of credit protection (from the Troubled Asset Relief Program) — and will absorb most of the losses, should they occur.
