There are no advantages to having ACS manage your loan. My loan was taken over by ACS after I consolidated with AES/BRAZOS. I had no problems with AES/BRAZOS. I made monthly payments and everybody was happy. After the loan was taken over by ACS, I have had to spend hours on the phone with this company’s spokespeople first somewhere over in the middle east and now in Jamaica. Come on, if this company has a relationship with our government, let’s hire Americans to take calls. I also want to point out the problems I have had (1)I spent months on the phone and gathering information to verify my original loan amounts after ACS had all my undergraduate loans on my account twice (2)I have to prove whenever (this has happened more then once)my payment is not applied to my account – where it is applied I don’t know. Let’s get for-profit companies out the government business.

[Reply]

My dealings with them are a total disaster.
(1).They transferred my servicing in July of 2008 with no permission from me. Since then it has been a total mess.
(2). You must register to see your account and then to register your are forced to accept an agreement to an electronic statement in the place of paper.You also agree not to make check payments.
(3). Their site stated that you can order coupons (NOT!!!). They totally ignore these and keep badgering you to do an electronic payment.
After all the other incompetent activities I refuse to use their payment system and use my bank’s bill pay. At least I can trust them.
(4). I have tried to determine the payments. It is impossible. All that ACS will say it “level”. Everything I read says 10 years which means it should be about $50.00 a month but it is now over $80.00.
(5).Do not attempt to write them on Friday or within 72 hours os Friday. Almost every Friday response says :I am sorry but we cannot locate your account”. Even though the email you are using is the one you log in to see your account.I guess getting out the door for the weekend is more important than you.

I have demanded that they send my email to a supervisor and they refuse. They state that I must phone their 800 number. I refuse to do this after all of the lies. I want it in writing.

(6). They send you a “Payment Reminder” 2 – 3 weeks before the payment due date every month stating that your payment is “due and payable”. That thar be Credit Collection harassment to me. ALso, the email is incorrectly coded as “Content-Type: text/plain” which means that if your email clients does not assume that there is HTML in it you get to see all the nice coding.

Have fun folks.

[Reply]

I highly recommend NOT going with ACS also. Whenever something changes on my account, I can be assured that ACS will “happen” to forget or not process in time and they will continue charging me the old way. For example, when I left the country on student scholarship, ACS continued to process my loans even though I had filled in the paperwork to defer my loan. The next year when I was enrolled in graduate school, I checked to ensure my school was on the “national list” that would automatically inform ACS of my student status. My other loan company processed it just fine. For some reason, ACS couldn’t process the information in a timely matter. They continued to automatically bill me. When I called them to inform them of their mistake, they told me I would “Get a refund in 40-60 days.” There is no reason they couldn’t refund me INSTANTLY–unless they wanted to hold my money to make interest on it. This then happened again, THE NEXT MONTH, and the phone teller got angry with me for stating that it was not enough to be told he would “make a notation,” which is what they told me before. He refused to put me in touch with his supervisor. Poor customer service, and also, yes, not in the United States. Think about it–they offer 24/7 phone service. How else would they be able to do this unless their tellers were in another country?

[Reply]

Everything that Jocelyn commented is completely true! This has got to be the worst student loan center in America! Everything that happened to Jocelyn is happening to me! I’m an unemployed, full-time college student and should have my payments deferred but it’s taken these people more than two months to get it done. My school has sent paperwork twice and I’ve scanned and emailed my deferrment request twice and I’m still having payments taken out of my account in absurd amounts that I never agreed to! This is sooo wrong! Their tellers barely speak english and always have NO IDEA as to what I’m talking about. I’m supposed to be getting reimbursed more than $230 but that’s probably NEVER going to happen because they’ve been promising me that for the past two months! When I call to complain, they tell me to submit it in writing or they’ll make a note of it and take it to their supervisor to get it fixed. I’m beyong frustrated and am thinking about going to the BBB with these problems! I’m sure there are a whole lot more unsatisfied customers…..

[Reply]

ACS has been the WORST experience I have had in dealing with student loans. They send letters, that I call to ask questions about, and am told that they don’t know why I was sent the letter. They have taken inaccurate amounts out of my accounts and when I call they say that the “contract states that amount” EVEN WHEN I AM LOOKING AT THE CONTRACT and it doesn’t. You speak to person after person and continue to get misleading information. I finally got so frustrated that I consolidated my student loans and demanded a different processor. Very rarely do you get to speak with someone that English is their first language so it is sometimes difficult to understand. Maddening…

[Reply]

ACS is the worst company I have ever experienced. They credited someone else’s account with my money. It took nearly a year and threatening from the BBB to get any answers. I asked them how would I get my money back and they stated ” We sent the money to FEd loans so it is not our problem anymore”. I completely hate that when I call an “American” company nobody speaks ENglish. I want to find another company but dont know how to.

[Reply]

Wells Fargo recently transferred my student loan to ACS and it has been HELL trying to get any correct information from them and to pay on line these idiots want to draft my checking account. No way will I ever give these idiots access to my banking account.
Wells Fargo was so simple and easy and ASC makes me feel as if I am dealing with the welfare office.

[Reply]

ACS is terrible! I think they must be running some sort of scam regarding late fees. In the 6 months I began my payments with ACS, I have been charged late fees for 3 of the months. The first late fee resulted in ACS failing to send me my paper statements as they promised. I had to call them several times to get these statements. When they arrived, I was charged a late fee. The other two times, I had proof my payments were posted on time and they eventually removed the charges. But it took a great deal of energy and repeated calls to these charges removed.

It is typical the government favors ACS. There must be a democrat supporter somewhere on the food chain who was rewarded with that contract.

Imagine the money ACS collects if they charge 10,000 or 15,000 people bogus late fees? How many fail to notice? How many just pay it and move on? It staggers the imagination.

[Reply]

I COMPLETELY AGREE WITH EVERYONE HERE. STAY AWAY FROM ACS. I dealt with them on my private loans which I paid off because I could not deal with their incompetence. Now my Federal loans have been transferred to ACS! I am so mad about it. In the 1 month that they have had my loan, they were charging me 1.25% more in interest then my loan was supposed to be (now corrected but only because I stayed on top of it), took out the wrong payment amount, and refuse to send me a paper statement even though I have not opted in to receive emails. NEVER, NEVER use this company of your own accord! Their customer service is a JOKE, you can not get an intelligent person on the phone. I think they hire high school drop outs. This company should be shut down.

[Reply]

They are abysmal. They lied to me about my consolidation payment amounts and interest rate. I cannot get it fixed because none of their representatives speak a word of English. If there is a way to get rid of them, please let me know!

[Reply]

Unfortunately WF transferred my student loan to ACS so there’s nothing I can do about being stuck with them and their incompetent customer service. I firmly believe that ACS has some kind of strategy in making it difficult for borrowers to defer loans or obtain graduated payment plans. I have made numerous phone calls trying to find out where I stand with a graduated payment plan that I requested and every single time I get a different answer. The customer service reps are from Jamaica and are impossible to understand. I have asked to speak with a manager and was told there was not one! I feel like I’m in the Twilight Zone. I do not have these kinds of problems and unprofessionalism with Sallie Mae.

[Reply]