Presenter: Kristen Evans, Section Chief for Students and Young Consumers (CFPB) Moderator: Heather Brown October 29, 2019 2:00 pm ET <>Kristen Evans: Yes okay. Hello everyone. I wanted to thank you all for joining us today. As Heather mentioned my name is Kristen Evans. And I am the Section Chief for Students and Young Consumers here at the CFPB. So we’ve put together a webinar for students, prospective students, their families and those who help students just to discuss what you need to know before taking out and repaying student loans. So let’s get into it. This is the same disclaimer that Heather has already gone through so I will skip that. So before we get started I’m going to briefly give an overview of the section and our division. So I’m from a division here at the CFPB that focuses on educating and engaging consumers so they can make more informed financial decisions. The division also focuses on several specific populations including service members and veterans, those who are economically disadvantaged as well as older Americans. But I am from the section for students and young consumers and that focuses on one specific population which could include young adults who are thinking about attending postsecondary education and/or those of already attended and graduated from postsecondary education. So something about the section is that we help students and young adults to manage their money, build credit, save and pay for college and repay student debt. So I wanted to start off this Webinar by giving a bit of background into the specific population of students and young consumers. So more parents and young adults are beginning to save for college and recent studies have shown that the percentage of Americans saving for college had increased considerably since 2009. But it still means that less than half are setting aside money for their children’s college education plus only a small fraction of students receive a sizable amount of scholarship money. So this really means that we can expect a sizable share of students who will need to consider financing their degree. And that same study also found that about 45% of young adults have a student loan. So I know students graduate on average with about $30,000 in student loan debt. Students and other young adults are also at the stage in their lives when they are entering the financial marketplace for the first time. We are starting, they’re starting to use or think about using financial products and services and then they’re also thinking about building credit. But young adults continue to struggle to meet their current financial obligations and about 1/3 of young adults receive financial help from a family member. And they also have very little savings or do not have any savings at all. This leads to about 1/2 of student loan borrowers to feel financially constrained and stressed when it comes to repaying student loans. So this stress may also be exasperated by the fact that some students may not know the difference between federal and private student loans or they may not know whether they borrow federal or private student loans. They may not know how to calculate their monthly payment before they begin repaying. And this fear and stress has led to some regret for student loan borrowers and more than 1/2 said they would change their choice about taking out student loans. This is where financial education can really assist student loan borrowers and young adults to have the confidence to not only act but also plan for their own financial education and for their own financial situations. So financial education experts say that providing consumers with information is only part of the solution being able to manage your own financial life requires a combination of knowledge and skills. People need to be able to analyze costs, and risks and consequences of a particular financial product or service. They also need to know where to go for help. Okay, so this is the domino effect of student loan debt. So we have heard from student loan borrowers that student debt can impact their personal lives. For instance because of student loan debt they may be delaying getting married or forming a family. They may delay buying a house or they may never buy a house. They may delay saving for retirement or they may not save enough for retirement. Student loan debt may also have an impact on their job choices after graduation. And they’re less likely to start a business due to the strain of a student loan payment. So with that in mind I’m going to talk about some of the financial resources that we have available at the CFPB. Okay so for this Webinar I’m going to go over a few different topics from the different ways to pay for college, to tips to review your financial aid offer from different institutions, managing money and then preparing to repay student debt. Throughout the presentation I’ll also discuss different resources from the CFPB to help student loan borrowers or yourself through the student loan journey. Okay, so comparing programs and majors. So students or have finally decided they want a degree or a certificate after graduating high school but there’s a lot to consider before you actually step foot onto campus for your first class. The most important reason that one goes to school is to learn and obtain a degree or a certificate that will actually help them pursue a chosen career path. It’s always a good idea to look into several different schools. It’s good to take a look at each school's programs to see if it has the type of degree or the certificate that you really want to obtain. You should think about whether the setting and location of the school will fit your personal preferences. Do you prefer a large or a small campus or a small student body population? You know, these are personal preferences but they should be taken seriously. You want to be able to feel comfortable to complete the degree or program. We also advise everyone to look at the graduation rates for each school and the average salaries for graduates in your program. This will help one decide whether the school or program will help them reach the post-graduation goals and their future career. Okay, so before you step foot on campus you need to start shopping around for a school that is a good fit for you. If you are a student that is already through the application process or you’re working with a student that’s already, that’s going through the application progress - process you may already have a good idea at what point the school you want to attend, it’s cost, whether you’ll need financial aid and how you plan to cover any financial gaps. But if you’re preparing for college in the next few years or working with students or making these decisions there are a few good tips to follow. After you fill out the FAFSA the school will give you a financial aid offer letter. Not all financial aid offers look the same. For instance loans may not be clearly labeled. If you don’t know whether the financial aid offer is stating that you get free money such as scholarships and grants or whether it’s a loan you need to ask the financial aid office for more information. So if you’re comparing financial aid offers you also want to add up all the scholarships and grants for each college to determine how much you’ll have to pay out of pocket either through savings, family contributions or taking out student loans. So you compare those out of pocket expenses including your living and housing expenses to determine which school is a good financial fit for you. Some financial aid offers include information on loans that your parents are required to take out those are formally known as Parent PLUS Loans. If you receive financial aid offer with Parent PLUS Loans it’s a great time to have a conversation with your family to see whether taking out these loans makes sense for your family. And again ask questions to financial aid office if you need further information. So we also offer a comparison tool that allows students to compare the cost of college and financial aid offers from different higher education institutions. It allows students to put the input cost of attendance and their financial aid packages federal student aid, private funding sources and scholarships for up to three schools. It allows the student to compare the cost of each program. Even before students apply they can use this tool to help them decide which schools be the best fit for them financially. Students can use the tool to adjust how much financial aid they expect to get from a school or they can use the tool to compare how much their dreams schools would cost if they got no financial aid at all. The tool actually allows students to get a better overall picture of their future financial burden when deciding which schools to actually apply. And it may help them possibly choose a school that allows them to take on less student loan debt. Ultimately the student may not choose the college with the lowest net price or the college that will put them with the least amount of debt but at least knowing that net price can help you make a more informed decision. Okay, so let’s get into the nitty-gritty about what are the different ways to pay for college. So you’ve applied to schools and you’re looking into them and you need to decide how much you’re going to pay for college. So the first option is to search for scholarships and grants. Grants and scholarships are the type of financial aid that does not have to be repaid. This is free money. Grants are often need based and while scholarships are usually merit based. But I said this is free money but sometimes it comes along with strings that are attached. Usually you need to take a certain amount of credits per semester or you need to maintain a certain GPA while enrolled. So we actually urge people to read the fine print so they know how to remain eligible to receive that money. So after you’ve taken into consideration all of your free money you should have a conversation with your family about how much they can realistically contribute if at all. If your family decides that you have funds to contribute make sure that you have enough savings for a rainy day and are still saving for retirement and other necessary expenses. After all of that if you still have a gap in your funding and you must borrow to cover your education then we recommend that you apply for federal student loan. So for most borrowers it’s best to max out on federal student loans before you borrow private student loans. There’s some important differences between federal student loans of private student loans. Federal student loans can be more manageable for students in a few different ways. So first in some cases the federal government will subsidize or pay the interest on your federal student loan while you’re in school. So this can help you save money in the long run. Second, if your interest rate for a federal student loan - it’s generally fixed and it’s not variable private student loans can have a fixed or variable interest rate. And variable interest rate means that your interest rate and your payment could change. So having a constant payment may make it easier for your future finances since you won’t have any surprise or unanticipated increases. Also federal student loans allow you to enroll in a repayment plan based on your income. Later on in this presentation we’re going to get into different repayment plans. But really this repayment plan limits the amount we pay each month based on your income. And this can provide you a repayment plan that fits with your finances. The federal student loans also offer loan forgiveness which may be available after ten years working in public service. So it’s just a note about federal and private student loans. So if you want to obtain federal student loans you must fill out the FAFSA and you have to also fill out the FAFSA to be eligible for work study and/or federal grants. If your grants and scholarships and your federal student loans after you’ve added them all up are not enough to cover your cost of education you should really consider other options. You can either cut costs, you can consider getting one or more roommates, or a part time job or you can explore whether a different program or institution would be a better financial fit for you. After all of that if you still have a gap in funding you can shop for a private student loan. Private student loans are student loans that are not federal student loans. So these loans do not offer the same flexible repayment terms or protection provided by federal student loans. So private student loans are not funded or subsidized by the federal government. Private student loans are funded by banks, credit unions and state loan programs and other types of lenders. Private student loans generally have variable interest rates which means that they can reset every month just like we talked about and so their payments may change. In other cases, in some cases you can get a private student loan at a lower interest rate than a federal student loan but you really need to take into consideration other factors that federal student loans provide that are not universally offered in private student loans such as the availability of flexible repayment plans based on your income or the possibility of loan forgiveness programs. So that was a lot to capture in one slide but the CFPB provides a lot of Web, provides a Web tool to help you plan your financial life. These Web tools will focus on big financial decisions such as paying for college but they can also include smaller life decisions that can have a big impact. So on this slide you will see a screen grab of our paying for college tool. As you can imagine paying for college is some of the first major financial decisions that a student will make. So we’ve created this tool to help students walk through some of those important questions about paying and financing college. This tool can actually be used by prospective student loan borrowers, current students, or those who are working with students as they prepare to take out student loans or prepare for the upcoming semester. So as we’ll get to in later slides the tool also helps students make comparison between financial aid offers. It provides information and advice for optimizing to repay their student loans. And we also offer student financial guides to help students choose a loan and manage their college money. Okay, so let’s dig into the tool. So once you’ve decided you do a school and you want to figure out how to pay for it, you know, after scholarship, grants and savings if you still have a gap to fill we offer guides on how to choose a loan. This is a Web tool. It’s just a screen grab of the Web tool but it’s an interactive tool that walks you through key questions when you’re starting to think about taking out a loan. It walks through the different types of loans from federal to private loans and also provides tips on filling out the FAFSA. So all of the information that I’ve given on previous slides are also captured in this Web tool and it’s an easy to use interactive Web tool. It also goes into other information such as alternatives to private student loans. So now we’ve moved on in our student loan journey so - and we’re preparing to go onto campus. So let’s talk about money management. So first open up a bank account. We urge students to think about choosing a bank or a credit union that will be convenient for when they are at home and at school. We also urge people to shop around. We don’t want people to feel limited to only the banks or credit unions that have ATMs on or near their campus because some banks and credit unions will automatically reimburse fees for using any ATM. You can consider accounts that offer convenient services such as remote check deposits, mobile apps and online bill pay. After your school takes out your cost of tuition fees and any on-campus living expenses from your total financial aid award there’s often money left that you can use for other expenses like books. You normally have several options for how you get that money including direct deposit to your bank account, to a card that may also double as their student ID or they can get it by check or cash. Once you have a bank account we tell students to sign up for a direct deposit even before classes start because if they’re expecting money from their financial aid office they’ll often get the money faster than having a school write them a paper check. Next thing is that they should plan to budget for each semester. So if you have a fixed income make sure you have enough to cover all of your necessary expenses including housing and food. If there’s a gap like we talked about earlier you can either cut costs or consider working part time. We also ask students if they should keep track of how much they are borrowing. We say that you should remember to check in with your current financial plan and if you’re able to make payments on your student loans to cover the interest you’ll save money in the long run. So within that paying for college suite of tools we also offer a Web tool about student banking. It really is helpful for young people to know how to manage their money while in school. And this is our tool that will help them through navigating those decisions of opening up a bank account and how to manage their money. Okay, so we’re now preparing to repay student debt. So you’re about to graduate or to leave school. We always tell students to get their information in order. For most students they are given a six-month grace period from when they depart school or drop below full time which they do not have to pay their student loan. After this grace period they should be prepared to make their monthly payments. So we tell students to log into this, the Department of Education’s Web site called the National Student Loan Database. The link is provided here to check the status of their federal student loans. Unfortunately there’s no similar database for private student loans. So students should receive a paper in the mail with their payment amount and their contact information. And it usually includes information about where to send their payment or set up an online account. So we tell people to open up your mail even if you don’t recognize the company because it could be the student loan servicer attempting to contact them to get them ready to repay their student loans. Also during this grace period students have the option to choose the repayment plan for their federal student loans. So next we’re going to dig deeper into those types of repayment plans. Okay, so the repayment plans for federal student loans there are many of them and they’re listed on this slide. But the traditional and default student loan repayment plan is the standard fixed ten year repayment plan however there are several other federal payment plans that could be a better financial fit. So traditional payment plans are based on your payments and how much you owe and the interest rate on your loans while income driven repayment plans which are listed on the bottom half of the slide set your payments based on your income and family size. So we also want to note that you can change your repayment plan at any time free. You don’t need to pay a third party to change your student loan repayment plan. But keep in mind that switching plans for one with a lower monthly payment often means that you’re paying more over the life of the loan. So when it comes to federal student loans your best option is to get a more affordable payment through income driven repayment plans. You can always make extra payments if you’re able to. So let’s go the different repayment plans. The standard repayment plan it may be a good option if you can afford the monthly payments. Payments are equal, or set in equal amounts over a ten year period. And you can benefit by paying off your loan earlier than the other plans that are listed here because you’ll be less interest overall. The graduate repayment plan is a way for you to repay your student debt for those who expect their incomes to rise over time. Payments start off low and increase every two years over a ten year period. The extended repayment plan enables you to extend the time you have to pay back your student loans up to 25 years. If you extend the term of the loan you will pay substantially more interest over time but your interest will be significantly smaller. There are some restrictions to enrolling in the extended repayment plan so we urge students to contact their servicer for more information before converting to this plan. So let’s dig into income driven repayment plans. They’re designed to be affordable alternative to the standard repayment plans. Your monthly payments are based on your income and family size. And depending on your family size and income your monthly payment could be as low as zero dollars per month. Okay so IBR plans have extended repayment periods of 20 to 25 years after which any remaining balances is forgiven. The key to these income driven repayment plans is that you must recertify your income and family size each year with your servicer to remain on the plan. So depending when you took out your loans you may qualify for one or more of these plans listed here. Under the revised pay as you earn or repay your monthly student loan payment is capped at 10% of your discretionary income. And any debt that is forgiven after 20 years of payments are under – oh and any amount can be forgiven after 20 years and for undergraduate loans in 25 years for graduate loans. Under the Pay as you Earn or what we call PAYE or PAY your monthly federal student loan payment is 10% of your discretionary income. But your repayment amount will never be more than the payment under your ten year standard plan. I know it’s kind of confusing to think about but as your income rises if you’re repaying under the revised pay as you earn plan your payments could be higher than your standard ten year lovely payment. And that won’t happen under pay as you earn or the other income government payment plans listed below. So under Income Based Repayment commonly known as IBR your monthly student loan payment is capped at 15% or 10% of your discretionary income depending on when the loans were taken out. They’re never more than your standard ten year repayment plan and any remaining debt is forgiven after 25 years of monthly payments. And Income Contingent Repayment or ICR is capped at 20% of your discretionary income and any remaining that is forgiven after 25 years of monthly payments. Okay, so that was a lot to talking about federal student loan repayment plans but let’s dig into the state into private student loans. So unlike federal student loans there are no standard options to lower your monthly payments on a private student loan. Every lender is different. Some lenders will offer a modified repayment plan that will extend your repayment period which will reduce your monthly payment but you will need to contact your lender to learn more about alternative repayment plans that they offer. Okay, on this slide is a screenshot of our Repay Student Debt Tool. So this provides information to schools or to students who are attending school to understand how much they need to repay their loans and ways to do it. This tool will be particularly helpful for students who are thinking, who are just about to graduate or those who are already in a repayment. The Web site provides what they can and can’t do while they’re paying their student loans especially if they’re struggling to make those student loan payments. The tool allows borrowers to consider their options by selected the repayment scenarios based on their current situation. This can benefit borrowers by providing advice related to their specific situation, their loans, whether they are federal or private student loans and just basically their general situation. Okay, so I want to briefly cover some other resources that we have available. The first is “Ask CFPB”. This is a digital resource that gives consumers answers to commonly asked money questions and provides how to guides on specific money topics. There are questions specifically related to student loans in here and so it is a great resource. And you can find this on our Web site at consumerfinance.gov/askcfpb. We also offer a different resource if you’re a student or you’re working with a student who is not really sure what questions to ask or how to get started we’ve put together a landing page of the most “need to know” information related to student loans and borrowing student loans. The goal of this page is really to surface the most critical information a student would need to know about paying for college or repaying student debt. Overall this page is just used as a beginning place for financial newcomers and a place to quickly learn about the actions available to fix any emerging issues that they’re facing. Okay, so we also have resources for practitioners. I wanted to highlight that if you’re working with students if you’re a financial aid professional or a financial educator you can find resources to help you work with students. And you can find that at consumerfinance.gov/students. The bureau also offers blogs and consumer advisories on a series of topics. They’re all available on our Web site. I’ve provided a select few of the blogs related to students but there are many more topics and even wider than student loans than just student loan issues available on our blog. The blog can also be found at consumerfinance.gov. I should also mention that many of our resources are available for ordering for free either through print, download or bulk ordering. We offer, we also offer some publications in other languages. While not all resources are available in all languages we - you can browse which publications we have available by visiting the GPO printing office link on this Web site. Okay, so I thought we could switch gears in this Webinar to talk about a topic that I get questions all the time about and that his Public Service Loan Forgiveness. It is a complicated program. I’m going to try to break it down for you guys quickly and also offer some resources about how to apply and qualify for Public Service Loan Forgiveness. So here is the overview that we’re going to talk about. We’re going to talk about what is this program if you’ve never heard of it. We can also talk about how you can become eligible, what you should be aware of and how to apply for it. Okay, so what is Public Service Loan Forgiveness? So it’s a program that forgives the remaining balance on your federal direct loans after you’ve made 125 qualifying monthly payments. On your qualifying repayment plan while working full time for a qualifying public service employer and then completing the application process. That sounds like a mouthful and it is but we’ll break it down for a little bit. Okay, so there’s - this is the roadmap to qualify for Public Service Loan Forgiveness and you need four elements. You need to make sure that you have the right type of loans, you need to make sure you have enrolled in the right repayment plan, make sure that you work for a qualified employer and finally make sure that your payments are counting towards Public Service Loan Forgiveness. So let’s walk through those four key elements. The first is to make sure you have the right type of loans. So the only loans that qualify for Public Service Loan Forgiveness are federal direct loans. However if you have other federal loans such as those originated under the Federal Family Education Loan Program or FELP loans or if you have loans under the Perkins Loan program you may be able to consolidate those loans into a new direct consolidation loan to qualify for Public Service Loan Forgiveness. You can learn more about what type of loan you have by going to the National Student Loan Database system which the link is on the bottom of the slide. So borrowers with Perkins Loan should really talk to their servicer about the risk associated with consolidation because if you have a Perkins Loan you may give up other benefits by consolidating into a direct load. So you need to weigh those options before you consolidate into direct loan. So plus loans made to parents or Parent PLUS Loans are eligible for Public Service Loan Forgiveness but the repayment plans that are best for Public Service Loan Forgiveness are not eligible for Parent PLUS Loans. So you actually run the course of repaying the entire balance of those loans before you’re even eligible for forgiveness. So if you have Parent PLUS Loans and you’re thinking that you want to qualify for Public Service Loan Forgiveness I recommend that you consolidate into a direct consolidation loan and then begin repaying under an income driven repayment plan. The specific one for this case is called Income Contingent Repayment Plan which we’ve covered in earlier slides. So the second key element to Public Service Loan Forgiveness is to make sure you’ve enrolled in the right repayment plan. So all of the income driven repayment plans qualify, they’re listed here on this slide. The other plan that also qualifies as a standard ten year repayment plan, that is a standard, the standard ten year repayment plan is the repayment period of ten years. So you actually may pay off the loan before you have anything left to forgive. So we usually say that if you are - want to enroll in Public Service Loan Forgiveness that you should consider enrolling in an income driven repayment plan. Income driven repayment plans set your payment based on your income and your family size that we talked about earlier. So this would reduce your monthly payment but it may also maximize the amount that’s forgiven at the end. So that’s why IDR plans are your best choice if you’re seeking Public Service Loan Forgiveness. If you’re unsure of what type of plan you have you need to contact your federal student loan servicer and they’ll be able to tell you what plan that you are paying under. Okay, the next key element to Public Service Loan Forgiveness is to make sure you work in a qualifying job. So the type of qualified employers include federal and state and local governments, military service and certain not or profits that have a tax designation as a 501c(3) entity. There are also some exceptions for employers who work in public education. So you must work full time which means you must work the number of hours that your employer considers to be full time or it has to be more than 30 hours a week. This question comes up a lot is what is the definition of full time especially if you work multiple part time jobs. So you can combine multiple part time jobs to qualify for Public Service Loan Forgiveness but only as long as the number of hours cumulatively of those part time jobs average more than 30 hours a week. So it’s also important to note that it doesn’t matter where - it only matters where you work not what you do. So if you work at public school system which is a qualified employer since it’s a state entity you don’t have to be a teacher you can be an administrator, or a custodian and you could still qualify for PSLF because it matters where you work not what you do. Okay so two, figure out if your employer is a qualified employer. You could submit an employer certification form. A link is available on the slide. And while the form is not mandatory it is a best practice to submit the completed form at least once a year. It’s also a good practice to submit one every time you change employers this way you can stay on top of your qualifying payments. And of course always remember to keep copies for your records. Okay last but not least you need to make sure that your payments count. You can become eligible for Public Service Loan Forgiveness after making 120 qualifying monthly payments. These payments do not have to be all in a row they meaning that you can resume making qualified payments if you temporarily leave service or after periods of deferment, forbearance or unemployment. Only payments after October 1, 2007 qualify for Public Service Loan Forgiveness. This is because that’s when the program was created. So the earliest anyone could have qualified for Public Service Loan Forgiveness was in 2017. When you make payments they must be in full and they must be within 15 days of the due date. Any extra payments are also known as prepayments or overpayments they do not count towards Public Service Loan Forgiveness. You only receive credit for one payment a month. So it doesn’t really work in your favor for Public Service Loan Forgiveness to make a large lump sum payment throughout the year because you want to make a payment each month. So determine how many qualified payments you have if you’re already trying to preserve Public Service Loan Forgiveness. You need to submit completed Employer Certification Form or the ECF form to the PSLF servicer also known as Fed Loan Servicing. The servicer, Fed Loan Servicing will review the form and they’ll compare it to your account history and determine how many payments count towards 120 payment requirement. Okay, so I wanted to highlight some of the common problems that people are facing when they applied for PSLF and were denied. Hopefully highlighting these issues will help you take a closer look at your situation to see if you may have some problems and you hopefully you can catch them in time to correct the issue. So based on the Department of Education 47% of people were denied because they had missing or incorrect formation on their application form, 32% did not have eligible loans. So you need to make sure that you have federal direct loans. Those are the only loans that qualify for Public Service Loan Forgiveness. Twenty-five, or 21% did not work for a qualified employer. So these are the top three reasons why were denied for Public Service Loan Forgiveness. So if you’re on route to qualify for PSLF or if you’re working with someone who may qualify for PSLF make sure you check these top three elements and they are the common problems to being denied for Public Service Loan Forgiveness. Okay, so what else should you be aware of? There are a few things that you should be aware of. So this is kind of complicated but consolidating a non-qualifying loan such as a Perkins Loan or a FELP loan into a direct loan will restart the clock for PSLF. So for example if I had a FELP loan and I’ve been working in public service let’s say in its state government for six years once I consolidate my loan into a federal direct loan I will have to start over at zero therefore the previous six years working in public service do not count towards PSLF. So I will need to work another ten years in public service to qualify for PSLF. So the best way to avoid this situation is to make sure that you have the right loans, the right repayment plan and you work for a qualified employer as soon as possible. So because you don’t want to be assuming that you’re qualifying for this program when you’re not. So but also as I mentioned earlier if you choose to consolidate these loans there are some things you need to take into consideration such as if you have a Perkins Loan you may become ineligible for certain benefits of that Perkins Loan. And also for my teachers there some highly qualified teachers in certain low income areas can be eligible for certain Teacher Loan Forgiveness Programs. You cannot obtain a benefit both under the Teacher Loan Forgiveness Programs and the Public Service Loan Forgiveness program for the same service. So teachers will need to decide whether they want to choose forgiveness under the Teacher Loan Forgiveness Program or the teacher, or Public Service Loan Forgiveness. And of course the big thing to qualify for PSLF is that you need to recertify your income repayment plan each year. Okay, so how do you apply for Public Service Loan Forgiveness? You’ve gone through this whole process and you have, you’ve already made 125 qualifying payments. So then you would need to submit an application form. You can either do it online through the link on this slide studentloans.gov/pslf or you can download a paper application and mail it in. But either way you need to submit a completed form only after you have made 120 qualifying payments. So as I mentioned this is a complicated program but don’t worry. We have guides that - to help students and those who work with students so they can work through this how to apply and qualify for Public Service Loan Forgiveness. We have guides that are tailored to specific populations including service members, teachers and first responders. So you can find these guides listed on the link on our - on this slide. Okay, we also have a few other resources to help you with Public Service Loan Forgiveness. The first you can contact a loan forgiveness specialist at Fed Loan Servicing. The number is listed here. You can also check the Department of Education’s Web site for more information. If you run into a problem at with the student loan the CFPB has a complaint function and you can submit a complaint to the CFPB. However if you are having a problem with Public Service Loan Forgiveness you need to submit a complaint to the Department of Education. And the Department of Education has their own student loan ombudsman which will be able to assist you through Public Service Loan Forgiveness complaints. We also have some information for employers. Any employers that want to provide information to their employees about out to qualify PSLF we have a toolkit that’s available on our Web site. Okay, and now last but not least I don’t have a list of everybody on this Webinar. So if you would like to receive additional information about our work I would urge you to visit either consumerfinance.gov/students or sign up for our email updates. You can also send us an email at students@cfpb.gov. Okay, I think we have some time for some questions so Heather I turn it back to you. >>Heather Brown: Thank you so much Kristen. That was wonderful. I learned a lot myself and you just covered every area that I had questions about in the past so thank you for doing such an excellent job on that, great information. So we’re going to as the operator to give instructions to the participants on how to queue up the question. And then after that maybe you and I will just talk a bit and maybe some questions will come in during that time. I don’t see any questions in our chat or our Q&A at this time. Operator, could you give the instructions please? >>Coordinator: Certainly. If you would like to ask a question please press Star 1 on your touch-tone phone. Please unmute your line and make sure to record your name when prompted so that I may introduce you. Once again it is Star 1 at this time. >>Heather Brown: Thank you so much. Kristen, one question I had when I was looking at that, it said that you didn’t have to make consecutive payments in other words it could be a gap. But then it also said if you were 15 days late that you would not qualify you had to be within 15 days of payment. And so does that mean that it has to pretty much be continual unless you have some sort of forbearance? >>Kristen Evans: So that’s a really great question. So basically you need to make a payment every month for that payment to qualify or you need to make one payment per month to qualify. So let’s say I have made a payment for August that month qualifies for Public Service Loan Forgiveness. But if in September I submit a payment that’s 15 days late that payment just doesn’t count towards Public Service Loan Forgiveness. >>Heather Brown: Okay. >>Kristen Evans: However if you worked, and so the other option is that if you work in public service let’s say for six years and you take a break you’re either unemployed or you leave for a for-profit service you can always pick back up and when you return public service to work so it just doesn’t have to be consecutive. >>Heather Brown: Okay great. That makes a lot of sense. I understand now. Thank you so much for that. Operator, have any questions come in the queue? >>Coordinator: No ma’am. We have no questions at this time. >>Heather Brown: Okay. So I had one other question Kristen which was, you mentioned a challenge with the Parent PLUS Loans that I can’t - I think you said that they often are paid off before. Is it longer than ten years is it - are the requirements different? >>Kristen Evans: Yes, so Parent PLUS Loans only qualify for what we call the standard ten year repayment plan. And so that means that you’re most likely to pay it off within ten years. There could be periods where the parent has chosen to take a postponement in payments either through forbearance or deferment and so the repayment period may be longer than ten years. So but they’re most likely to pay off the loans within ten years unless they take these other options to postpone payment. So I usually tell parents who have Parent PLUS Loans if they want to qualify for Public Service Loan Forgiveness they should consolidate into a federal direct loan consolidation loan and therefore they become eligible for another repayment plan called Income Contingent Repayment. And this is an income driven repayment plan that’s based on their income and family size and so the repayment amount may be lower. And so therefore it would extend the repayment period past ten years and therefore they’ll actually have an amount to be forgiven at the end. So it would maximize the benefit of Public Service Loan Forgiveness. >>Heather Brown: That’s great information. Operator, do you have any additional questions that may have come in? >>Coordinator: No ma’am we do not. >>Heather Brown: Okay. Well it sounds like you did a thorough job and answered every question. You certainly had a lot of information there. I tried to put some of the Web sites up. I couldn’t keep up with you because it was so much information. >>Kristen Evans: Sorry. >>Heather Brown: Oh no, that was wonderful. But everybody could download a copy of the slides hopefully in a couple of weeks it’ll be up maybe sooner and so you feel free to get that information. And the transcript will be also there so you can go back and get all of the information that you need. So I appreciate everybody joining us. And Kristen, thank you so much for sharing all that knowledge with us. And we’ll look forward to having you back some time maybe next year to update us on what’s new. >>Kristen Evans: All right, that sounds wonderful. Thank you all. >>Heather Brown: Okay have a great day everyone. Operator, we’re going to conclude. >>Coordinator: Thank you. That does conclude today’s conference call. We thank you all for participating. You may now disconnect and have a great rest of your day. END NWX-CFPB HQ Moderator: Heather Brown 08-22-19/1:00 pm CT Confirmation # 9446074 Page 27