Student Loan Borrowers See Unexplained Debt Payment Increase

Some student loan borrowers have recently accused a company of miscalculating their loan payments and raising the prices.

In a post to X, formerly Twitter, on Wednesday, the Debt Collective, a union of debtors, said, "We are hearing a ton of reports that MOHELA is miscalculating people's monthly student loan payment amount, sometimes forcing people to pay several thousand dollars more every month and giving them no way to fix the issue. If this happened to you reply below with your story."

MOHELA, the Missouri Higher Education Loan Authority, is a company that handles student loan payments for the federal government and several other social media users responded to the tweet from the Debt Collective sharing their experiences making payments with the company.

User Timothy Babulski wrote, "Under SAVE rules & pre-COVID income (since they haven't made us recertify) I should be paying $0. MOHELA has me at over $210/month. Even w/ my current income I'd still be under $100. Being robbed of $1,200-$2,500 might not seem like much to some, but it's a big deal to me."

Babulski told Newsweek on Wednesday that to his understanding, the change in payments is a miscalculation by MOHELA.

The accusations made against the company come ahead of the scheduled resumption of student loan payments, following the U.S. Supreme Court's decision against President Joe Biden's student loan cancellation plan.

Regardless of the Supreme Court's decision, student loan payments are set to resume in October, after they were paused numerous times by former President Donald Trump and Biden, due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.

"I have tried," Babulski told Newsweek in regard to contacting MOHELA. "I've actually filed a complaint on one of those people who tried to routinely use all the levers of power."

According to Babulski, prior to the pause on payments his monthly amount was around $180, and this miscalculation on MOHELA has raised his payments to over $200. Babulski told Newsweek that under the current SAVE income-driven repayment (IDR) plan, the increase in the poverty line would result in his payments being $0.

A number of other social media users also accused MOHELA of miscalculating their payments.

"Prior to the pause my payments were ~$80. Mohela has my payment at over $1300," X user Kelly Nicole Long wrote in a post.

X user casey_danforth wrote, "Under SAVE my student loan payment amount is exactly the same as it was prior to the changes. It makes absolutely no sense, I even calculated what it would be on the FSA, which is half of what I am being charged."

While speaking with Newsweek, Babulski said, "This is the time for the Biden administration to go big and go bold...there's just been crickets from the Department of Education on this."

Newsweek reached out to MOHELA and the Debt Collective via email for comment.