Public Loan Forgiveness Overhaul

[carrotsmakemefat]

Do we think there is a chance for actual change here ? I’m optimistic but not so sure.

I am glad GAO finally did a report on this.

woub.org/2021/10/01/a-troubled-public-service-loan-forgiveness-program-will-get-an-overhaul/

[taratru]

I'm going to rage post about this. I *am* the person they claim this overhaul is supposed to help. I can guarantee that they will include some loophole that discredits all my payments since 2005 because I've now left the country.

I am so.tired. of the platitudinal bullshit that passes for "oh, we prioritize ____!" in the US. If anyone actually cared about any public service positions or the people in them, these loans would have been forgiven already.

Don't even get me started on the FAFSA I just filled out that gives an estimated family contribution for college of 37K a year. For two teachers. Maybe we'd have more if we weren't, you know, paying our student loans.

[waverly]

I doubt it. They have definitely gone out of their way to make it impossible for about 98% of people. This was a segment on 60 minutes last night focusing on military.

It's too late for me. I already paid mine off, and I doubt I will be re-imbursed ever. If I am, I guess it will be found money.

They tried every excuse in the book. 1. You consolidated your loans. 2. You aren't in the right program even though I called and asked 12 years ago. 3. You aren't in the right repayment plan even though I asked about that too. 4. And finally, you got married and your husband makes too much. I've worked in public service for 14 years, and I never missed a payment. 

ETA- I was told originally that I was in the correct program and the correct payment plan.  And I was never told not to get married/ that my husband's income had anything to do with it. 

I think they must tell their loan workers the wrong information when answering the questions or they straight up tell them to lie.

[amberlyrose]

My mom has taught for over 20 years and has still had issues with the PLF program. She was TWO years away from being done almost 10 years ago and they screwed something up and said the last 8 years didn't count or something. I've never seen her more devastated. My parents just assume they are going to die with student loan debt at this point.

[karinothing]

Oct 4, 2021 12:14:51 GMT -5 waverly said:

I doubt it. They have definitely gone out of their way to make it impossible for about 98% of people. This was a segment on 60 minutes last night focusing on military.

It's too late for me. I already paid mine off, and I doubt I will be re-imbursed ever. If I am, I guess it will be found money.

They tried every excuse in the book. 1. You consolidated your loans. 2. You aren't in the right program even though I called and asked 12 years ago. 3. You aren't in the right repayment plan even though I asked about that too. 4. And finally, you got married and your husband makes too much. I've worked in public service for 14 years, and I never missed a payment. 

ETA- I was told originally that I was in the correct program and the correct payment plan.  And I was never told not to get married/ that my husband's income had anything to do with it. 

I think they must tell their loan workers the wrong information when answering the questions or they straight up tell them to lie.

huh. Your husband's income should only have to do with the amount of your actual payments, not whether you qualify for actual forgiveness. I am sorry you had so much trouble.

[waverly]

karinothing, In a way yes. But by the time I start the whole 10 years over, and then pay the amount I am supposed to pay based on his income- the loan would have been paid off anyway.

But if anything comes of this where people can get their money back then I will aggressively pursue it.

I came into some money, and decided for the amount left which wasn't a huge amount, that I would just pay it off and be done with the it. I know people who had way more than me thinking they are golden on the forgiveness thing and did everything right, and maybe they were and were one of the 2% of the lucky ones, but that is not the norm.

It's not just me that had so much trouble. It is everyone, that is the point. www.latimes.com/business/story/2019-09-05/most-student-loan-borrowers-rejected-by-loan-forgiveness-program

[underwaterrhymes]

My husband and I were both screwed out of this. I don’t think they ever intended for the majority of people who should benefit to actually benefit.

[leshoequeen]

Oct 4, 2021 12:14:51 GMT -5 waverly said:

I doubt it. They have definitely gone out of their way to make it impossible for about 98% of people. This was a segment on 60 minutes last night focusing on military.

It's too late for me. I already paid mine off, and I doubt I will be re-imbursed ever. If I am, I guess it will be found money.

They tried every excuse in the book. 1. You consolidated your loans. 2. You aren't in the right program even though I called and asked 12 years ago. 3. You aren't in the right repayment plan even though I asked about that too. 4. And finally, you got married and your husband makes too much. I've worked in public service for 14 years, and I never missed a payment. 

ETA- I was told originally that I was in the correct program and the correct payment plan.  And I was never told not to get married/ that my husband's income had anything to do with it. 

I think they must tell their loan workers the wrong information when answering the questions or they straight up tell them to lie.

Could've written this post myself.  I, too, called multiple times to make sure I was in the right program with the correct repayment plan and was always incorrectly told yes.  When I applied for forgiveness is when I found out I was in the wrong program.  

[eport]

Oct 4, 2021 13:27:44 GMT -5 leshoequeen said:

Oct 4, 2021 12:14:51 GMT -5 waverly said:

I doubt it. They have definitely gone out of their way to make it impossible for about 98% of people. This was a segment on 60 minutes last night focusing on military.

It's too late for me. I already paid mine off, and I doubt I will be re-imbursed ever. If I am, I guess it will be found money.

They tried every excuse in the book. 1. You consolidated your loans. 2. You aren't in the right program even though I called and asked 12 years ago. 3. You aren't in the right repayment plan even though I asked about that too. 4. And finally, you got married and your husband makes too much. I've worked in public service for 14 years, and I never missed a payment. 

ETA- I was told originally that I was in the correct program and the correct payment plan.  And I was never told not to get married/ that my husband's income had anything to do with it. 

I think they must tell their loan workers the wrong information when answering the questions or they straight up tell them to lie.

Could've written this post myself.  I, too, called multiple times to make sure I was in the right program with the correct repayment plan and was always incorrectly told yes.  When I applied for forgiveness is when I found out I was in the wrong program.  

My friend had an issue in that her loans would be forgiven if she worked in low income schools. She qualified but was rejected as they could not find one of the schools in their database. Turns out the word school was spelled wrong in the name in the government database, therefore it didn't match and outright rejection.
Did end up getting fixed as she is persistent.

[Jalapeñomel]

Just fucking forgive student loans. This is all so confusing and frustrating.

[waverly]

I think the point is that they don't want to forgive these loans, and the result has been either outright fraud or complete ineptness.

One example given was the student loan company routinely took out a penny less on the automatic payments for years, so then they didn't count because it was a penny off. Also, apparently if you pay too much that won't count either.

[pumpkin]

Honestly I doubt it will help me. And even if it had the potential to, I’m not sure what I’d need to do because I don’t completely follow all the details.

I’ve been a Fed for over 12 years now but have never been in the forgiveness program and have been paying in my loans for 15 years now. When I consolidated them interest rates were some of the lowest in history (at the time) so it made sense to do so. When I became a Fed and looked into the program it didn’t make sense for me to sign up as my repayment plan didn’t qualify and in order to switch I’d have to give up my interest rate; and to be honest, as a single person I couldn’t wholly afford the income based payments as they are kind of ridiculous (if I remember as a GS7 my payment would have been like 3 times what I was already paying and about 25% of my take home).

So I think there’s no hope for me, unless I’m missing something that one of you can kindly explain to me. But the whole program has needed an overhaul for years.

ETA: I’d love to see something like a flat $ amount of forgiveness for all the public sector employees that have never and will never qualify. That would probably be my best bet at getting any SL help.

[gretchenindisguise]

It's interesting the tenor difference between this post and the one on ML.

I originally posted in the ML and was hopeful. Then I come to this one and the pessimism really sets back in. Lol.

I agree with Jalepenomel - just forgive the SL and create the program from scratch. Otherwise all of us hopefuls will just be strung along for another 3 years and will continue to pay them and get screwed. Again. My very cynical brain thinks that's the goal. They know there has been a certain amount of noise about SL forgiveness - if they can give us a glimmer of hope - it'll die down and they can get away with just collecting and doing nothing for a few more years.

[tiramisu]

I could never qualify in the first place because I couldn't afford to be on an income-based repayment plan. They confirmed to me that cost of living wasn't taken into consideration at all, so someone living in rural Iowa making $40,000/year and someone in Southern California making $40,000/year would be expected to pay the same. So I gave up. My current job doesn't qualify, I don't think, so I guess it worked out that I never tried to pursue PSLF. The system is beyond broken. I don't the overhaul will do anything to help everyone who truly needs it.

[mrshandy]

I was in the same boat as pumpkin I looked into this and realized that I would have to double my payments. I couldn't afford it at the time. I was pretty close and even consolidated with one company, but I discovered that it wasn't going to qualify because I was in the wrong payment plan. So I backtracked and went back to my original company.

I recently refinanced my loans and got a better rate and will be done paying them off much faster. But it has to still taken forever. By the time I'm done it will be nearly time for my DS to go to college. Ha!

[lilypad1126]

Every time i think about this program, I get mad. Either forgive student loans or don't, but don't make borrows jump through these impossible hoops.

My loans aren't in a program that qualifies for PSLF. I have worked in public service since I graduated in 2005, but my federal loans are locked in at a 4% interest rate. When this program came around, in order to qualify, I would have to consolidate/refinance/whatever the term is at a higher interest rate, albeit paying less due to needing to be on an income based payment. Well, great, but from the beginning I was wary/nervous that the program would actually work to forgive the loans. So, b/c I am extremely lucky and can afford my payments, I've just stuck with my currently plan (and now I pay a little more each month).

And sure, I'm now 10 years past the beginning of this program so maybe the remainder would have been forgiven, but the amount of issues friends of mine have had with this program have made me glad that I'm at least making a (small) dent in the principal. I am SO HAPPY for every.single.person this program has worked for. I just don't have it in me to call/fight/argue regularly over the course a decade to make sure I'm in the right plan, paying the exact right amount, etc etc.

I haven't yet refi'd my federal loans into a private loan at a lower interest rate b/c I do keep holding out SOME amount of hope that they might just forgive a portion of federal loans. But the second I feel like that hope is gone, I'm either consolidating or paying off (depending on how much I have left at the time).

[bimbi284]

I applied a few months ago and was approved, but since loans were on pause and FedLoans will no longer be the PSLF servicer, I guess I’m in limbo. Idk who I’ll be paying off my loans to once they start being paid again in 2022 🤷🏻‍♀️.

[pumpkin]

I’m so glad this program worked for a few of you, but also sadly glad to hear there were also in my same boat (nice not to be alone).

It’s just screwy the hoops one has to jump through and what has to be given up for the potential of possibilities repayment. No way was I giving up my fixed, less than 3% interest on 4 years of private grad school loans; even if I could have afforded it, that would have been hard to stomach.

[karinothing]

Oct 4, 2021 15:53:19 GMT -5 bimbi284 said:

I applied a few months ago and was approved, but since loans were on pause and FedLoans will no longer be the PSLF servicer, I guess I’m in limbo. Idk who I’ll be paying off my loans to once they start being paid again in 2022 🤷🏻‍♀️.

I am not sure fed loans no longer being thr servicer will complicate things but I applied for forgiveness in July and they were forgiven end of October last yr (even when loans were on pause). I hope your receive notice soon.

[bimbi284]

Oct 4, 2021 15:57:35 GMT -5 karinothing said:

Oct 4, 2021 15:53:19 GMT -5 bimbi284 said:

I applied a few months ago and was approved, but since loans were on pause and FedLoans will no longer be the PSLF servicer, I guess I’m in limbo. Idk who I’ll be paying off my loans to once they start being paid again in 2022 🤷🏻‍♀️.

I am not sure fed loans no longer being thr servicer will complicate things but I applied for forgiveness in July and they were forgiven end of October last yr (even when loans were on pause). I hope your receive notice soon.

Thanks! To clarify, I applied to get into pslf and start making payments. My application was approved saying I’m eligible for the program, but I don’t yet know what my payments will be monthly or who I will be paying.

[atexan]

Count me in as someone who has worked the right kind of job for 10+ years (close to 15 now) and has the right kind of job but the wrong kind of repayment consolidation plan.

If I had figured this out at the beginning of my career and changed my repayment I would have been paying more every month but my loans would be forgiven by now. By the time I figured it out, changing repayment meant that my monthly payment would skyrocket (more than double) and the clock would start on 10 years. By the time I'd be eligible for forgiveness I would have paid them off.

It makes me so angry. If you want to forgive loans for public service, then fucking forgive loans for public service. I'm in favor of forgiving loans for everyone, but this program does not and has never done what it supposedly set out to do.

[plutosmoon]

I said over on ml, this program was set up to fail. Too many rules the average borrower wouldn't understand. I work in Financial aid, and one of my early jobs out of college was helping students consolidate student loans. Most borrowers had no idea what they owed, to who they owed and what type of loans they had.

I looked into pslf in 2007, I was entry level higher Ed and my ex husband was a second year public school teacher. In 2007 we each made under 40k and our combined loan balance was about 50k. We were both on graduated payment plans. Moving to an IBR would have increased our payments and our loans would have been paid off around year 9, resulting in no forgiveness. I feel like we were target audience for the program and we didn't qualify. I paid my loans off by 2010.

My ex's loans went into IBR when they changed the formula for REPAYE. He is still paying on them (or was in 2019) but is no longer a teacher.

Just give everyone under a certain income some forgiveness, make all loans zero percent and for goodness sake congress get rid of the damn origination fee on the loans. By now if someone has paid on their loans 10 or more years, they've paid what they borrowed and then some.

Sometimes I get a tinge of jealousy at the thought of loan forgiveness, but that doesn't change the fact it's the right thing for a large chunk of borrowers.

[Jalapeñomel]

Oct 4, 2021 17:07:31 GMT -5 plutosmoon said:

I said over on ml, this program was set up to fail. Too many rules the average borrower wouldn't understand. I work in Financial aid, and one of my early jobs out of college was helping students consolidate student loans. Most borrowers had no idea what they owed, to who they owed and what type of loans they had.

I looked into pslf in 2007, I was entry level higher Ed and my ex husband was a second year public school teacher. In 2007 we each made under 40k and our combined loan balance was about 50k. We were both on graduated payment plans. Moving to an IBR would have increased our payments and our loans would have been paid off around year 9, resulting in no forgiveness. I feel like we were target audience for the program and we didn't qualify. I paid my loans off by 2010.

My ex's loans went into IBR when they changed the formula for REPAYE. He is still paying on them (or was in 2019) but is no longer a teacher.

Just give everyone under a certain income some forgiveness, make all loans zero percent and for goodness sake congress get rid of the damn origination fee on the loans. By now if someone has paid on their loans 10 or more years, they've paid what they borrowed and then some.

Sometimes I get a tinge of jealousy at the thought of loan forgiveness, but that doesn't change the fact it's the right thing for a large chunk of borrowers.

I disagree with the income limit unless they factor in cost of living, which they won’t. As someone mentioned above, income looks different depending on where you live.

I received teacher forgiveness, and it reset my payments back to 0, so I have another 10 years before I’ll qualify. I’m still not sure that was the right decision, but it did lower my monthly payment quite a bit.

Edit: or if they do set an income limit, it should be something substantial, so the majority of folks will benefit from it, not like $75k or $125k.

[wanderingback]

Oct 4, 2021 20:05:46 GMT -5 Jalapeñomel said:

Oct 4, 2021 17:07:31 GMT -5 plutosmoon said:

I said over on ml, this program was set up to fail. Too many rules the average borrower wouldn't understand. I work in Financial aid, and one of my early jobs out of college was helping students consolidate student loans. Most borrowers had no idea what they owed, to who they owed and what type of loans they had.

I looked into pslf in 2007, I was entry level higher Ed and my ex husband was a second year public school teacher. In 2007 we each made under 40k and our combined loan balance was about 50k. We were both on graduated payment plans. Moving to an IBR would have increased our payments and our loans would have been paid off around year 9, resulting in no forgiveness. I feel like we were target audience for the program and we didn't qualify. I paid my loans off by 2010.

My ex's loans went into IBR when they changed the formula for REPAYE. He is still paying on them (or was in 2019) but is no longer a teacher.

Just give everyone under a certain income some forgiveness, make all loans zero percent and for goodness sake congress get rid of the damn origination fee on the loans. By now if someone has paid on their loans 10 or more years, they've paid what they borrowed and then some.

Sometimes I get a tinge of jealousy at the thought of loan forgiveness, but that doesn't change the fact it's the right thing for a large chunk of borrowers.

I disagree with the income limit unless they factor in cost of living, which they won’t. As someone mentioned above, income looks different depending on where you live.

I received teacher forgiveness, and it resent my payments back to 0, so I have another 10 years before I’ll qualify. I’m still not sure that was the right decision, but it did lower my monthly payment quite a bit.

Edit: or if they do set an income limit, it should be something substantial, so the majority of folks will benefit from it, not like $75k or $125k.

Yep agreed.
I really just pretty much bury my head in the sand regarding my loans. I know I’m super privileged with my income, but my loans are a major source of financial stress that have directly affected my life choices and have meant I haven’t been able to save anything for retirement for example.

With med school I think it’s even getting worse and worse. My loans are around 350k (all from med school) I think, but others graduate with 500k and more. I’m in a "lower paying" speciality plus live in a super expensive place. I literally have extra jobs outside of my full time job to be able to afford it all and live "comfortably". Thankfully the extra work I do I actually enjoy it, but at one point (when I owned a car) I honestly thought about doing something like lyft/Uber to put all that money towards loans.

Maybe there should be some formula in regards to how much more your loans are vs your salary and taking in to account cost of living.

[plutosmoon]

I have no idea what income level makes sense, but high enough that a forgiveness program is meaningful for those who need it and not so high that it won't pass in congress. I feel like 400k (200k/person) for a married couple is the sweet spot for congress on these kinds of things, I don't know if that number makes sense. I'm sure the government can come up with an formula, they do so for lots of things, maybe an option, but again complicates things. It'd be nice if any new loan forgiveness is easy to understand, or we will have another program like pslf. I mean the answer could be no income limit, I just don't see that passing and then we end up with nothing. I want an easy, sustainable program borrowers can utilize for years to come.

Reform on loan forgiveness is needed, but it needs to start with reforming aid and making colleges affordable with more grants so students don't get in over their heads in the first place. Pell grants top out around $6500, a family of 4 that earns 50,000 a year generally won't qualify for the full amount. It's infuriating how little we fund higher ed.

Grad schools, med schools and law schools are a whole other issue when it comes to loans and aid. The loss of subsidized loans at the grad school level was a huge blow, I was working with graduate populations when that happened and the rates on grad loans in general are ridiculously high. High rates and unsubsidized loans only compound repayment issues.

[ChillyMcFreeze]

Misery loves company and all, but it's such a relief to hear that I'm not just lazy for not jumping through the hoops. I've always felt... ashamed?... that I wasn't choosing a qualifying repayment plan. DH and I file jointly but pay our bills totally separately. Factoring in his income really screwed me on monthly payments and I couldn't justify it. I could take on a higher repayment now, but I'm going to ride out my deferment and put that money toward other, higher interest debt. I'm holding onto hope for some major reform in the next 5 years!

[atexan]

Oct 5, 2021 6:34:39 GMT -5 ChillyMcFreeze said:

Misery loves company and all, but it's such a relief to hear that I'm not just lazy for not jumping through the hoops. I've always felt... ashamed?... that I wasn't choosing a qualifying repayment plan. DH and I file jointly but pay our bills totally separately. Factoring in his income really screwed me on monthly payments and I couldn't justify it. I could take on a higher repayment now, but I'm going to ride out my deferment and put that money toward other, higher interest debt. I'm holding onto hope for some major reform in the next 5 years!

Agree.  I still feel ashamed that I didn't do my homework as soon as this went into effect.  In 2007, my loans were in forbearance because I was on post-doc and making pennies.  I had gotten all this information about consolidation and how it was the best decision financially because of the low interest rate etc etc.  So I felt confident that I had already made the best choice.

I vaguely remember hearing about pslf and thinking, huh, maybe I'll qualify for that one day, I guess I'll figure it out later.

[karinothing]

www.washingtonpost.com/education/2021/10/06/public-servant-loan-forgiveness/

Some more details. Hopefully this helps some folks.

[formerlyak]

This sucks for those of us who have been working in the public sector for 10+ years but refinance our federal loans for lower interest rates and they are now private loans. It will affect a lot of my colleagues who went back to school to get grad degrees for career advancement, tried to get into the PSLF program, but based on income would have to increase payments and the loans would be paid off before 10 years, so they could technically never get the loan forgiveness. But in a hcol area none of us could afford those payments so we refied to lower payments so we could afford houses and child care.

[lilypad1126]

Well, huh. After reading through a bunch of articles on this, I may actually now qualify. I don't even know how to feel about that. But I'll play the game and refi to a direct loan and see how it shakes out over the next year. I'm still wondering what the catch is, but this is the most hopeful I've felt about this program actually being able to help me.