erudio student loans

[mrsbug]

Hi, I have an old student loan from 1998 which I have been deferring since then as I have never earned enough to pay it back (there are some advantages to being poor )

I recently had a letter from a company called erudio student loans saying they have bought my student loan from the government. All very reassuring about how the t and cs of my loan won't change, etc.

Now I've had the regular deferral letter from them and it's much more detailed than before. They want my bank details which I'm not really happy to give, and they say my details will be checked with a credit reference agency, which I don't think they used to do - my loan has never shown on my credit file.

Has anyone else had this? Do I have to give them this info?

Email the ICO with your query. [email protected] You get a much more in depth and expert reply from them doing that.

I see lots of advice given by various organisations that say 'they are probably allowed to pass on details of deferment to CRAs' or words similar. But in my view if they are allowed then;

Why are they specifically highlighting this and asking us to sign again? They could just register the info with the CRAs and tell us after the fact it's all legit.

They are not allowed to change any terms and conditions. If this is the case 12b of original agreement stated info would only be shared with CRAs when in default. Any info passed to CRAs when not in default would be a change in T&Cs surely?

Why are they being so cagey about coming clean on this (Erudio). So many people must have asked for clarification about this point by now, if everything was legit and above board they would just come out with the legal jargon that give them their legitimacy.

I think a lot of these 3rd party organisations being consulted are giving advice based on a normal DCA/debtor relationship, this is far from that. This is only the 2nd time this has happened (sell off of student loans), so there is little precedent. Erudio didn't just buy the loan, they bought the original T&Cs, they contain section 12b.

I think it would take specialist in depth advice, to thrash this out. Who has the time, finance and will to cross that bridge ? I'll wait to see whether or not they grant deferment, there's a legal advice option in my house insurance policy, I'll whip that out if needs be.

People I know who have queried with the ICO have been told that the matter is complex and they will need to look into it in more detail before they can give a definitive answer. ICO said it may be a few weeks before they can take advice and say.

Have today received a letter from Erudio that they have taken over my loans for 98 and 99. Thesis already have 97.
I am in agreement with all previous posts re changes etc. My main concern is the recording of a deferral on my credit report and any effect it will have on my credit rating and more importantly that of DH who I am financially linked to.
Spoke to Erudio and was told that the loan will not affect my credit rating, will just show that there is a loan and it is deferred. Am not convinced and told them so. I have also spoken to Experian and Equifax and like you Qubit was told that it hasn't featured on a credit file before.
Frustratingly it seems that nobody has any answers to these questions??

Infact I think whether or not deferment will be registered with CRAs might be a bit of a red herring. I think the real turd in the tea cup will be actually getting them to accept deferral. Hope I'm wrong but I think they'll be trying to find any reason to refuse deferment (even when you are fully entitled to defer ) and just try to wear you down with misinformation and redirection .

Trying to get you into default or hoping you just say feck it and offer payments. They don't have to take us to court, they can just refuse deferment on spurious grounds, demand payment and put us in default if we don't stump up. Then the harassing phone calls and letters begin. By then your credit rating is down the crapper and the pressure starts to mount.

You may be right IchibodT. My deferment doesn't end until July so it will be interesting to see what happens to those due earlier.
Have spoken to Thesis who advise that SLC will still administer deferment of the loan they have taken over. Leads me to wonder what, if anything they actually do?

well i was told on my trek to find just that answer by the SLC that it was a breach of our T&Cs.
That is really important to know about what the CRAs say. We all need to tell erudio we wish to complain about this and those other issues in the forum, then wait to see their replies. We did hear yesterday on this and another website that 2 people had been either told over the phone or in an email that CRAs wouldnt now be notified...but we dont have a physical letter from anyone statiing this yet sent by erudio.
If it shouldnt be on the forms, they need to redesign those deferment forms and start again because how will would we be able to sign them now.
Also, mail The Department of Business innovation and skills at complaints.bis.gsi.gov.uk and explain this very issue and the other issues about why it is all so wrong. They made the deal with erudio and have an official procedure to investigate if erudio have screwed up.
We do need solid legal advice...

@halfpricedebt

...sort of - I sent Erudio a covering letter refusing consent for any changes to T&Cs and refuting that the submission of the form was consent to a change in the T&Cs. On the form itself, I blacked out any areas which were more than the information requested by SLC. I black-lined the CRA warning & Fair Processing notice and beneath my signature wrote again that I refused any consent to changes.

To anyone thinking of making a low repayment offer to Erudio - unless you're already earning over the repayment threshold - don't do it - because unless you are ridiculously aggressive or hostile or do something daft, if Erudio take you to court - you will win as long as you earn below the threshold.

If you already earn above the threshold - well, to a large extent, the CRA and T&C changes don't matter to you, because you will be obliged to begin repayments now anyway and Erudio are allowed register those repayments with CRAs.

I worked as a secretary in a large commercial law firm for about 10 years (I am not a lawyer and I have no specialist legal knowledge) and my experience of writing 100s of letters on contract disputes is that nobody gives a bat's shit in hell about the Terms and Conditions of any contracts UNLESS you're threatening to take them to court.

This is a civil matter, not criminal, nobody gives a flying feck in government or anywhere else.

We, any borrower, would have to be off our trolleys to pre-empt any decisions by Erudio by threatening any form of legal action - unless there are some millionaires deferring their student loan repayments.

HOWEVER, if you are GENUINELY entitled to defer, and they don't let you, THEN AND ONLY THEN - cancel your direct debit under the Direct Debit Guarantee Scheme - then if Erudio want their money they will have to take you to court - and they will have to pay - not you!!!

AND - if you are GENUINELY entitled to defer - THEY WILL NOT TAKE YOU TO COURT BECAUSE THEY WILL LOSE - guaranteed! And they know that!

I am not a lawyer but that is the sum of my experience and the knowledge I've gained in the past few weeks researching this. Take all opinions at your own risk - and sorry for the CAPS

That would be great, for me, if SLC were still administering on Erudio's behalf. I never had a problem with SLC in 12 years of deferring.

Ah well, what are the high points in life worth if you don't have a little of the low to gain some perspective from?

@ emptycoffers

They don't have to take you to court, they can just put you in default and destroy your credit rating and then harass the hell out of you.

That's pretty much how they went about things when they were dealing under honours student loans. If you don't mind your credit taking a battering then it might not bother you too much.

I'm sure there are ways to deal with this but most folk will just cave and pay, a few determined ones will fight the good fight and win but that will be few people, and Erudio know this.

@IchibodT

my limited understanding is that to register a default against you at a CRA, they would have to get a County Court Judgment.
Which means they would have to prove their case in fron to f a judge.

I don't think you can just register defaults willy nilly off your own bat but I'm not an expert on that.

I believe the CRAs have to see evidence.

I have had problems in past with SLC and deferring but thankfully easily sorted and I always now send everything recorded delivery.
I am expecting deferral with Erudio to be a bit of a nightmare.
I am also slightly peed that this year I will have two lots of forms to fill in and will have to chase both SLC and Erudio.

@ emptycoffers

I had a default for £129 registered with CRAs when I cancelled a CC DD a month early by mistake. It was my mistake and I cleared the debt within a month but the default stayed on my credit file with all 3 CRAs for 6 years and wrecked it. No courts were involved.

that sounds good emptycoffers...and dont worry about anyone offering a low repayment offer, i tried and didnt even get a chance to say how much. The agent told me that even if i offered 5000, he wouldnt be able to listen to it. They seemingly want the whole pie or nothing from deferers, which i find rather odd, especially since BIS told me in no uncertain terms that the reason the debt was sold so cheaply was because BIS thought that most deferers would never be entitled to pay it back. We are almost half the loan book sold, with most of the rest those on the run. Those defaulters were considered erudios main targets by BIS and that erudio would need to spend money tracking them down, so it was all sold at a low price. However, erudio seem to have different ideas about how much of the £890 pie they can slice into. Back to the point though, the person at BIS who i spoke to who discussed the issues of the deal with Erudio, said that Erudio actually asked if they could settle short, something they dont seem to want to do right now. The erudio dude i spoke to said that if this changed we would all get letters telling us such.

And CRAs almost always side with the companies rather than the individual . After all they make most if their money from organisations not us, and we have to pay them to check our files in the first place. It can be a nightmare getting a default removed (even if it was placed on the file in error)

There are probably reams of regulations on that whole area - on the difference between late payments, in arrears, default, CCJs etc.

In the end, Erudio only make money by getting it off borrowers, and the only way to get it is to get a CCJ which will allow them to go down the whole bailiffs route.

BUT - IF YOU ARE ENTITLED (GENUINELY) TO DEFER - they won't do this, because a judge will hold that the only reason to refuse deferral (as in the SLC Freedom of Information answer I linked to previously) is if a borrower earns more than the threshhold and the judge will not allow a CCJ at that point.

That's my theory and I'm sticking to it!

@IchibodT - I hear what you're saying about late payments/missed payments etc. Of course, they affect your record even if the lender doesn't get a CCJ - (without a CCJ however, they won't be able to force you to repay which is what we're talking about here in relation to Erudio).
There are 100s of ways unscrupulous lenders can mess with your record - and some they are entitled to do because otherwise nobody would ever feel the need to repay.
Erudio are not entitled to do what they say they will do but unfortunately, we have to wait until they actually do it, before anyone can do anything about it.

@erudioed - it's early days for Erudio yet. I'm sure they are cross-referencing ages/dates of birth with loans and will probably offer better low repayment deals when people are approaching the 'write-off' ages - 50, 60 etc. At this stage, I think they'll play hardball for a while.

After all, even on this thread, among people who are legally and morally ENTITLED TO DEFER, Erudio have created enough anxiety to have them reaching for chequebooks to send money they probably can't afford, never mind don't have to repay.

Their tactics are working already. If Erudio turn the screws on people just another couple of notches, they'll have people who are royally entitled to defer, offering to repay the whole amount.

No wonder they thought £160m was a reasonable price - they've already got people who hadn't repaid for 15 years asking them to take their money!

yep totally agree emptycoffers. But we still need to fight our corner because the way i see it, they are playing hardball, and they promised BIS they would be acting very differently to a debt collection agency and treating borrowers fairly. Thats why we need to raise awareness outside the erudio system and our forums in case it does turn nasty and to force erudio to get it right because we dont need this kind of agree every communication we get from them.

@emptycoffers Are you willing to share a copy of that letter?

@ emptycoffers

I agree with the sentiments of everything you say, and I also agree that no one who is bellow the threshed should be offering any m

Damn mobile posting, anyhoo to continue.

No one who is below threshold should be offering any money. But these companies don't operate by taking people to court (or only very rarely). They know there will be some hard core cases who will resist but the majority of people will pay up just at the threat of getting a default in their credit file. It can set you back years when it happens and this us their tactic.

They don't only get paid when they take a case to court because a large number of those entitled to be in deferment will choose to pay rather than argue, get the default in their file, then spend his knows how long trying to get it removed.

@halfpricedebt

Dear .....

In reply to your letter of xx/xx/xx, and related deferment guidance, I note that the requirements to successfully defer remain the same as last year and I further note your acknowledgement that the terms and conditions of the original agreement(s) with the Student Loan Company are unchanged.

Please find enclosed:

• Deferment Application Form conforming to, and satisfying, requirements for deferment last year.
• Relevant supporting documents.

Submission of this deferment application does not indicate consent to, or by implication, acceptance of, any changes in the terms and conditions of the original agreements made with the Student Loan Company.

Additionally, and for clarity, it should be noted that submission of this deferment application does not indicate consent to, or by implication, acceptance of, any information about having a deferred loan being shared with credit reference agencies or indeed, any change in the way information about me or my loans is processed.

Yours .....

@IchibodT

I totally hear what you're saying. You know it, I know it and they know it.

Luckily, fingers crossed, I'm not anticipating applying for credit this year - any other time it might have been different.

And if I was planning to take a mortgage or anything in the next few months I would be a wreck - hell, I'm a wreck anyway!

But, after a lot of wobbling, I've decided, because I know categorically I'm entitled to defer, that if Erudio refuse my deferral, I will immediately cancel the DD, get my bank to get any payments back from Erudio and I will make them take me to court if they want to get their money and, at their expense, we can then argue out the T&Cs in front of a judge and see them come up with a justification for refusing deferral when they have been given all of the relevant information.

that sounds like a good plan. If they refuse one they will do it to everyone. Maybe we get a class action if they do, with the priviso being to have the loans cancelled and receive compensation for unnecessary stress and such things. The compensation could pay the lawyer.

@ emptycoffers

unfortunately this is exactly the position Im in, the timing couldnt be worse. For the first time in my life Im in a position to finally buy a home of my own with my partner. However, both of us now have this to contend with.

Thanks for sharing the letter you wrote to them. I wondered instead of not filling in the fields (such as NI) on the form I could just refer them to their records as all relevant info should have been supplied by the SLC.