Hello, can someone please help me understand what happened w my loans. I started school Jan 18 and attended the Jan and march terms no issues. Received 1200 credit checks each term. Then received a scholarship in May 18 I called the school and notified them to send the bill ( 80%of tuition only) to my employer. My employer did not send a check for tuition until January 19 for past terms. During those terms my loans paid my tuition and the school sent me a check every term for funds left over. In January they received my scholarship money and then sent me a $4,000 check stating overaward. In the last month of my program (April) the school began decreasing my loan amounts and sending funds back to the loan provider (US dept of education). Now I have a balance w the school of $4000 that they require I pay out of pocket. Something seems wrong here, I don’t understand if this is illegal it just poor practice and what can I do about it? Can someone please help me understand how this works when I was being sent refund checks every term?
I can’t say for sure what happened because I don’t have all the facts. What I suspect, though, is that the scholarship (and possibly employer tuition payment) put you in an over award situation. You can only receive a combination of financial aid up to the cost of attendance. If the scholarship (and possibly employer tuition payment) put your total aid (all resources, including employer payments, grants, scholarships, work study and loans) over the cost of attendance by $4,000 … so the school was required by law to return the $4,000 in loans.
Of course, there may be another explanation. The way to find out is to meet with a financial aid advisor & ask for an explanation.
Thank you for your response. The problem is that they sent me a refund every single term so there should be no balance due. If a person owes money to a company they do not return funds to them. I told them about the scholarship In May so they were aware. That should have been calculated in award package correct? I think they messed up and over paid me and now want the money back?
Listen again to @kelsmom.
It doesn’t matter what you told the school…or not. If the fact is that you were awarded $4000 aid in excess of the cost of attendance, you are REQUIRED to return any over payment sent to you.
So…if your scholarship and employee benefit made you go over the cost of attendance by $4000 during the 2018-2019 academic year…regardless of when you received the scholarship, you must repay that money in excess of the cost of attendance.
If they over paid you…you are required to pay the money back. You weren’t entitled to it if it was an overpayment.
Go talk to your financial aid department.
I did talk to my fin aid dept. who can’t even tell me what my COA was… so what you’re saying is. The ppl In charge of my money are able to make mistakes w it and thats ok? Every session I was in the negative in my favor. So looking at my student acct at the school it looked as if I didn’t owe. I even called and asked about a $700 difference in my favor and was told that it would just roll over until the end of the program and I would get it back at the end… I do not trust this fin aid dept as this is a for profit school and I’m not sure where to turn to resolve the situation or at least help me understand it. When I ask them if they overawarded me they cannot answer that directly. ??♀️ The numbers are as follows… 23,665 borrowed. 10,238 sent back and 7,581 sent to me with a scholarship of 5,574 paid. COA is about 20,000 I think? And my EFC is 2,400.
Why are you attending a for profit school? Aren’t there any community colleges near you? If you don’t trust the people handling your money then it’s a good time to leave.
Is it okay? No. Can anybody do anything about it? I think the answer is also no. You can’t get more than the cost of attendance.
What’s your major and career goal? Are there any other colleges near you?
You borrowed $23,665 but $10,238 was returned, so the amount owed on your student loans is now $13,427. what you haven’t said is how long you went to school for and what the tuition/fees were for all those terms. Of that $13427, you received $7581, so that means the school applied $5846 of loan money towards tuition. they also received some amount of money from your employer.
Was the amount the employer was paying for tuition reimbursement for courses already taken or was it a scholarship for the current semester? That would make a difference in whether the school had to reduce the amount of your loans because if it is a scholarship, you can’t go over the COA but if it is reimbursement (in which case the money really should go to you because you’d already paid for the tuition (through a loan) and it is just an overpayment.
You need to list how much all the semesters of school has cost you, how much you’ve paid, and how much you’ve borrowed. You need to know if the money paid by your employer was tuition reimbursement or a scholarship.
For profit school?
Even if it is a for profit school doesn’t mean the school is just out to steal money or that they do not have to follow federal loan laws. The math is the same - take the COA, subtract the payments made through loans, the employer payment, other payments. When the FA office did the true up after receiving the employer’s payment, it returned the loans to the federal govt.
@austinmshauri
Most online colleges are for profit. I’m currently a graduate of this school. I graduated at the end of April. Right about the time they adjusted all my loans. I was an ADN nurse I am now a BSN RN w intent to continue on to MSN, FNP. I am a single mother that works full time. Online classes were best for me
@twoinanddone so would I have received the same amount in student loans if my company paid all along the way instead of at the end? How is it that they paid me out more than they kept? I don’t understand why the school sent me money when there was a balance on my And why did it take them 4 months to make these adjustments? Can I request an aid increase since I just graduated?
I doubt it…retroactive aid increase? Based on…what?
Are you sure your degree had been conferred? Many schools don’t give a degree with an outstanding bill.
@thumper1 so why did the school send me more than they kept? I feel like yes they probably did have to send the funds back per federal law but when awarding a fin aid package do they not have to take into consideration all forms of award and adjust accordingly? If they were aware of the scholarship why did they not adjust when i told them about it? It would have left me owing also if the money from scholarship was not received…
I think you need to check on whether the amount from your employer was a scholarship or tuition reimbursement. If reimbursement, why did your employer pay the school and not you?
Usually scholarship are paid in advance of the semester and reimbursement is paid after you complete the course. Reimbursement shouldn’t have been paid to the school but to YOU, since you’d already paid the school (through the loans)
At this point, the school wants $4000? ‘back’ for loan overpayment, is that correct? Is your employer going to reimburse any more tuition? Will that cover the amount you still owe?
I think you should figure out what your entire tuition billed was, the entire amount of loans given to you and returned, and the amount your employer has paid. Do the math and figure out where you are.
The school must have discovered that you were over awarded, and they were required by law to return loan funds to the government (which does reduce the amount of loans you owe). They are required to fix their mistakes,. I realize it’s not great for you, but it had to be done. You owe the school because they had to send the money back.
You will not be able to borrow any money now. Once the semester is done, you can’t borrow (and your program of study is done, right? You couldn’t borrow for sure).
If you are concerned that they did something wrong, you can contact the financial aid director to ask for a detailed explanation of what happened.
@thumper1
Yes my degree has been conferred. The only thing they do is send me to collections within the school and possibly not release my official transcripts, but I spoke w them today they are going to release those also.
Make a payment arrangement with them. As a nurse you should earn a good salary.
Don’t wait for it to go to collections.
@mommdc it has nothing to do with the amount because I can easily afford it in one month of overtime pay. The point is they didn’t do their job correctly. They just sent me another $40 Che k and can’t tell me why. They have also billed my employer a class they had to eat the cost of. If I don’t do my job correctly ppl die. Accountability for those handling my loans is the issue here.
Both my kids have an online portal at their college where they and authorized user can see all charges and credits posting to the account with date and description.
I was simply saying, try to resolve this with the school, and don’t wait until they send it to collections.
@mommdc I have been on the phone w the school for the past 3 weeks everyday that I am not working. No one can explain this to me. They just sent me a check for $41 last week even though I have a bill of $4,000 and they are still sending loan money back. It makes no sense to me at all. Fin aid cannot tell me why they sent me the $41 check last week if I owe. It just all seems like a very strange situation to me. I feel they have no idea what they are doing and I’m so frustrated. When I look at my online portal it always says -$152 or -340 as in they owe me,but every single check they have sent they have then added back on to the term total. She even told me she can’t send me the $340 because I have a balance owed! I need help understanding this and I do not know where to turn. Btw this school,come to find out, is on the heightened cash monitoring list…