Posted and up-to-date on 12/15/2020
Introduction
On March 27th, emergency legislation called the CARES Act was signed into law in response to the COVID-19 public health crisis.The law includes some relief for borrowers with federal student loans that are held by the federal government.
- The new law does NOT apply to private student loans or to federal student loans made before 2010 by banks and private lenders.
- To find out if you have a federal student loan, log in to the National Student Loan Data System.
- This is the U.S. Department of Education database for student aid. You can look here to find out if you have any federal student loans. This will only give you information about FEDERAL student loans, not private loans.
- If you don't know whether you have private loans, check your credit report. Any private loans should show up on your report. You can get one free credit report every year. Request your free credit report.
Do I have to pay my student loans?
The new law suspends payments on certain types of federal loans until January 31, 2021.
- The suspension applies to federal student loans that are held by the federal government.
- The suspension does not apply to private student loans or federal loans not held by the government.
- The suspension is supposed to happen automatically, without the need for student loan borrowers to contact their servicers to request the suspension.
- The suspension of payments is different from requesting a forbearance.
Will I still be charged interest on my loans?
No. If you have federal student loans that are suspended under this law, it won't gather interest during the time it is suspended.
Will the suspension of payments impact my eligibility for Public Service Loan Forgiveness?
The months in which loan payments are suspended will be treated as qualifying payments toward loan forgiveness.
I am currently in a rehabilitation plan for a defaulted loan. How will the suspension of payments affect the status of my rehabilitation?
The months in which loan payments are suspended will be treated as payments toward an authorized rehabilitation plan. If you can afford to make your payments toward a rehabilitation plan, you can still make those payments.
Can my wages, Social Security or tax refund still be garnished?
The law also suspends forms of involuntary collection for defaulted loans, including wage garnishment, tax offsets and Social Security offsets. In a press release on March 25th, the Department of Education announced that it would stop garnishments to many student loan borrowers and that offsets that were in the process of being withheld on March 13, 2020 will be refunded to borrowers.
The Department also stated that they will rely on employers to make changes to employee’s paychecks and suggests that borrowers contact their human resources department.