If you’re a student loan borrower whose loan is being serviced by Navient, you may have heard the company is going to be transferring its loans to another company. What does that mean for you?
There is a lot going on behind the scenes, but the good news is the impact on you should be minimal. But you should still know what’s happening.
Below, we’ve got a breakdown of what’s changing and what you need to know.
1. What does my loan servicer do?
It might seem confusing, but the student loan servicer is not the same as your lender. The lending company actually ponies up the cash for your loan. The servicer handles administrative processes, like keeping track of your payments and figuring out if you’re eligible for any student loan forgiveness programs. The lender is assigned by the U.S. Dept. of Education when you take out the loan.
2. What's changing?
Navient asked to end their contract to service federal student loans this year. The contract will run until December 2023, but the company is already transferring its loans to a new company — Aidvantage, which is the loan servicing division of a company called Maximus.
You may have already heard from Navient (or Aidvantage) that your loan is being transferred. If you haven’t, you probably will sometime in the next few months.
3. What does this mean for me?
The good news is that the transfer shouldn’t have much impact on you at all.
Sure, there will be some changes, including getting mail from Aidvantage instead of Navient. What won’t change: your payment plan, interest rate, monthly payment, etc.
There is one thing you should do: Contact Navient now (or Aidvantage if your loan was already transferred) to ensure they have the right contact info for you — not just your mailing address but also your email and phone number. If an important notice gets sent to the wrong place, it could become a bigger issue.
Once the transfer has begun, it’s also a good idea to double-check your next few payments are received and logged properly.
4. What if Navient services other loans of mine?
There is one wrinkle: Aidvantage is only getting federal student loans. If you happen to also have private loans or FFELP loans (older loans issued under the Federal Family Education Loan Program) that Navient also services, they will not be transferred.
Unfortunately, that also means you’ll have two servicers, with separate websites, and you’ll have to make two separate payments, etc.
5. What is Aidvantage?
As we mentioned above, Aidvantage is a loan servicer within Maximus. Maximus is new to the federal student loan business but has been providing services to government agencies since 1975.