Student loans pre-1998 bought by Arrow Global aka Erudio

[Pip]

This was mentioned on the news feed:
http://forums.all-about-debt.co.uk/s...llector-Erudio

I have several of those loans and I've never earned enough to start paying them off -- I've deferred payment successfully with Student Loans Company every year by sending them copies of three months' payslips. Now however, Erudio a.k.a. Arrow Global have paid 5p in the pound for these loans and now own them. There's a major discussion on mumsnet that I'm following:
http://www.mumsnet.com/Talk/legal_mo...-student-loans

The gist is:

• Erudio may report deferrers (as distinct from defaulters) to credit reference agencies
• The deferment forms are now extremely invasive and want to know very detailed information about you, far more than the Student Loans Company ever requested, e.g. NI number, whether a homeowner or not, phone number, email address, credit cards held, etc. etc.

As for what is required for deferment, the actual legislation states:

The borrower can defer making repayments of the loan if—

(a)the lender has not already asked him to repay the loan in full, and

(b)he can show—

(i)that his gross income for the relevant month is not more than the deferment level, and

(ii)if the lender asks, that his gross average monthly income during the 3 months immediately following the relevant month will not or is unlikely to be more than the deferment level.

The discussion thread on Mumsnet above is loooong and disorganised, but people are coming together and exchanging information. There are some people on there who have done a lot of digging and sharing useful tips and suggestions.

I have sent off my deferment request in the form of a letter rather than using their form, so I'll be watching developments closely and digging my heels in!

Just wonder if any AAD bods are in a similar situation?

[Pip]

Re: Student loans pre-1998 bought by Arrow Global aka Erudio

PS In the discussions it seems that people are of the opinion that Arrow/Erudio are going to turn many genuine deferrers into defaulters ... by making the forms hard to fill in and making it very difficult to actually defer payment. Once a deferrer becomes a defaulter, then they'd be fair game to the DCA machine.

[Riz]

Re: Student loans pre-1998 bought by Arrow Global aka Erudio

Well, they would want people to pay up and not defer. They are in it for a fast profit. No other reason.

[Pip]

Re: Student loans pre-1998 bought by Arrow Global aka Erudio

This is what the BBC has said about the status of this batch of loans:

• 46% [in deferment] of borrowers are earning below the repayment threshold
• 40% [in default] are not repaying in accordance with the terms and conditions of their loans
• 14% are repaying

"Erudio" has bought £890m of outstanding loans for £160m. (There has been mention of "for 5p in the pound" but my reckoning would show 17.98p in the pound).

It's early days yet but it'll be interesting to see how legitimate deferrers are treated over the next few months; whether they'll be targeted in the same way as defaulters. As per the legislation, if your income is less than 85% of the national average wage, you are allowed to defer for a year at a time; no doubt Erudio/Arrow Global will be buggering around with the goalposts and I doubt their admin operation will be up to the task of dealing with deferment applications en masse!