More than forty-two million Americans have student loans with an outstanding balance of more than 1.4 trillion dollars so it is no surprise that scammers are focusing their attention on these students and former students through scams that falsely promise to provide debt relief. I have written numerous times in the past about various student loan debt relief scams. In 2018 I first told you that the FTC settled claims it brought in October of 2017 against the operators of two student loan debt relief scams Student Debt Doctor (SDD) and American Student Loan Consolidators (ASLC). Both companies had their assets frozen by federal courts following the initial complaints being filed against these companies. Under the terms of the settlement both companies are banned from the debt relief business forever and ordered to pay millions of dollars in fines. Both companies collected illegal upfront fees and falsely promised that their customers’ loans would be immediately and permanently forgiven.
In June of 2022, the FTC sent a first round of payments to victims of the scam and now, because there are further funds collected from the two companies an additional round of payments is going out at this time. For more information about this refund, go to the section on the first page of Scamicide.com where it indicates “FTC Scam Refunds.”
TIPS
The old adage still is true. If it sounds too good to be true, it probably isn’t true. Many of these student loan debt relief scammers promise quick loan forgiveness, which is unrealistic. In addition, you should never pay any upfront fees for student loan debt relief assistance. Those fees are illegal and are a sure indication that you are being scammed. Also, remember my motto, “trust me, you can’t trust anyone.” Don’t trust scammers merely because they use names that sound like they are affiliated with the government. ASLC falsely claimed that it was affiliated with the U.S. Department of Education, which it was not.
For information you can trust about federal student loan repayment option, go to https://studentaid.gov/ There you can learn about loan deferments, forbearance, repayment and loan forgiveness programs and there is never an application fee. If you owe private student loans, contact your loan servicer directly.
If you are not a subscriber to Scamicide.com and would like to receive daily emails with the Scam of the day, all you need to do is to go to the bottom of the initial page of http://www.scamicide.com and click on the tab that states “Sign up for this blog.”