<p>So S's school has their Fall bill due on 9/1. Last year, his Unsub had not come through by late August and I called the school to see if we should pay the balance just in case it didn't come by the due date. They said not to worry about it, because the Unsubs were typically late but the school didn't assess the late fee due to that. I didn't trust them, and paid the balance early anyway. We were later refunded the Unsub Loan once it was posted to the school.</p>
<p>This year, I didn't pay the Unsub amount in advance of the due date, which we would have had to borrow (with interest/fees/etc.). I trusted that the same "rule" would apply as last year. Today, we got a notice of the late fee due because the Unsub hasn't been posted and the account is now overdue. I'm going to call tomorrow, but right now I'm very upset about it. </p>
<p>Does it seem totally unreasonable to at least ask them if they would remove it?</p>
<p>I would call and ask. My daughter summer classes once where the loan did not post until after the bill was due (because she did not reach half time status until the 2nd mini session). I asked if she would incur interest and they said they would charge the interest and then back it out once the loan was disbursed. Seemed a bit convoluted to me, but that was exactly what happened.</p>
<p>I suspect that is what will happen in your situation, but definitely ask to make sure.</p>
<p>At my daughter’s school, the financial aid office and the registrar’s office are across the hall from one another, but there seems to be no communication. They tend to leave her scholarship credits off the bill every semester. Your kid’s billing office may well be unaware that the direct loan is coming.</p>
<p>To make it more fun, she can’t use scholarships and grants for summer semesters. So she has to borrow money for the summer, then gets a huge refund in the fall because her grant is for much more than the fall tuition costs…l</p>
<p>D payment plan had to be set up and first installment paid by Aug24th , Staffords did not post till Aug 28th. I set up plan for amout minus the Staffords so they assessed me a $100 late fee. I e mailed and asked for it to be waived (nicely) as my plan was totally right when the Staffords posted, they took off the fee.
Just explainand be polite</p>
<p>I will say that something similar happened to me. A scholarship didn’t come through and I was charged a late fee. It was immediately refunded once the scholarship went through. It could just be an automatic fee that will be refunded. </p>
<p>Just wait til you contact them, I’m sure it will be fine :)</p>
<p>We have the same situation every year. Here’s how the Accounting office explained it to me:</p>
<p>Once the loan has been approved by the lender and certified by the school, Accounting can see that it’s pending. However, the loan is not disbursed until the lender is sure that the student has actually shown up. Student shows up, lender notified, loan disbursed, funds applied to student’s account.</p>
<p>The problem at my D’s school is simply timing (and it’s not really a problem, just the way it is). Once the student is confirmed as being there, it takes a week or two for the loan to be disbursed and applied. But because school starts in late August, the Sept. 1 bill is generated and mailed before the loan is settled. By the time I get the Oct. 1 bill, the loan is there, the late fee is reversed, and all is well. </p>
<p>Just because I’m OCD, I always call the college shortly before school starts and confirm that they can “see” the loan and that everything is cool. There’s never been a problem.</p>
<p>I just wish they would look at the students pending and accepted loan statement which I can see BEFORE they send out scary emails they are going to dump classes or charge late fees. </p>
<p>Like a cross check, get some student to run down a parallel list of student with balances due and compare to list of pending loans, scholarships, and grants for that student. Then send out emails to those who appear to be lacking. Instead of an auto late fee and auto drop of classes threat. </p>
<p>I know there are thousands and thousands, but at least before stoping classes, do one last double check to see if school is late doing it’s job.</p>
<p>LasMa is right. You need to realize that the vast majority of financial notices you receive are independently sent by “the system” based upon rules. The colleges don’t want to play with those rules because there are always some people who are not eligible for loans they’ve applied for.</p>
<p>Called Financial Aid and they said the loan wasn’t posted because a conflict between the FAFSA and the school code caused it to be rejected. They’re resubmitting, and will send separate notice to Billing to remove the fee. </p>
<p>Totally agree with Seahorsesrock that someone should run down all the “problem cases” before they get all fired up to send out Late Fee notices. Wouldn’t that save time and money? There’s only 3500+ students, surely they can’t ALL have issues at the same time.</p>
<p>Thinking next year we’ll go back to paying in advance of the loan disbursement just to avoid having to deal with the bureaucratic snafus. :(</p>
<p>The late fee notices are probably automatic. </p>
<p>Interesting that this seems to be pretty par for the course at all schools. I thought it was pretty daft when the FA department at my D’s schools told me that’s how they handled things. Surprised to learn it seems like the norm.</p>
<p>By sending out the automatic notices and charging late fees becUse they didnt post in a timely fashion and then having to remove late fees causes so much angst I don’t understand why they do it this way. The amount of people hours wasted on the phone, with emails, etc can’t possibly be made up by the late fees that are actually legitimate.</p>
<p>And the bad will, crankiness, and frustration felt by parents can’t be good for relationships either.</p>
<p>sylvan, why not just call the school a couple of weeks ahead of the start of classes? That should give them time to straighten things if there’s a problem, and avoid some stress for you.</p>
<p>BTW, I think I wasn’t clear above. I do pay before the start of classes. But I deduct the amount of the loan, after calling Accounting to be sure that it’s in the pipeline. </p>
<p>Our statements come with a little worksheet on the back of the remittance stub, but I could certainly just make a note on the remittance stub if there weren’t a worksheet. Either way, it lets Accounting know why I’m paying the amount I’m paying, and probably gives me a stronger argument if they don’t remove the late fee right away. I write something like this:</p>
<p>$ XXXX - Statement balance
$( XXX) - Less student insurance (waiver enclosed)
$( XXX) - Less federal loan pending
$ XXXX - Payment (enclosed)</p>
<p>This way they can see that I’m not just paying some random amount, and there’s a reason for what looks like a short-paid bill.</p>
<p>Sylvan…in your case, it sounds like it was GOOD that this happened when it did. Otherwise how would you have known that your loan had been rejected?</p>
Not technically something I needed to know, since they are correcting the confusion with the loan people, which has nothing to do with us. The loan should come through once it’s cleared up.</p>
<p>A conflict between the FAFSA and the school code? Sorry, but that makes no sense. The student enters the school code on the FAFSA, and the school won’t get it if it is incorrect. The exception to this is when a school has more than one school code (satellite campus, med school, law school with different school codes), and the school might have the FAFSA in its computer system … but chances are the student would not be awarded, as the school code is not technically correct so wouldn’t link up. That would be a student-initiated problem. The school sends its info pre-populated, and the computer file is received by the federal processor. I don’t understand how the school code could get mixed up. This explanation seems odd … </p>
<p>As for loans not being posted, they cannot be posted to a student’s account until they are received … and they cannot be disbursed more than 10 days in advance of the first day of school (which for many schools means they won’t be disbursed less than 7 days before school begins … if not UNTIL it begins). While some schools have figured out ways to list “expected” aid, most do not … they expect the student to use his/her award letter to determine how much aid will be posted & subtract that when paying. Many schools will post a late fee if something doesn’t get disbursed on time (loan issues, scholarship check not received, etc), but they often remove the fee if there is no amount due once the aid posts to the account. There can be a lag in removing the fee, as that part is usually manual … meaning someone works from a report to remove the fees, which isn’t going to be a daily task. It’s more likely to be weekly or whenever there is breathing room to get to it.</p>
<p>Unfortunately, financial aid and billing are not simple … not in the least! I worked at a huge state U that was always working like crazy just trying to keep up. I now work at a very small school … but I still have to work like crazy to get everything done in the extremely short window allowed by federal regulations, and I am also at the mercy of the manual accounting process that posts money to students’ accounts & generates refund checks. Finaid offices and school business offices are notoriously understaffed … and underpaid, I might add. :)</p>
Sorry for the technical confusion, kelsmom. I meant the way the school coded S (as a Junior) while on the FAFSA it says he is a sophomore. Apparently this type of conflict in information will cause the loan to be rejected. The school has to tell them that for purposes of how much he can borrow, S is a junior.</p>
<p>Ah, that makes sense. Yes, that absolutely does cause a rejected loan. I have had to fix many rejected loans caused by incorrect FAFSA year-in-school and loan amounts. Computers are great, but they can also allow mistakes to slip through unnoticed!</p>
<p>I understand the difficulty, but when the school sends a list of loans, grants, etc For the student to accept, and a private loan shows the school has the loan, then the student does all they can do. </p>
<p>So the loans are indeed there,the dollar amounta from sallie Mae, Feds etx are there, it’s a matter of applying to student account, meantime bursars office sends out mean email regarding late tuition. And then me having to call bursar saying please don’t drop daughters classes, if you look all the money is there…it’s just not “there”</p>