5 star: | (5) | |
4 star: | (1) | |
3 star: | (1) | |
2 star: | (2) | |
1 star: | (10) |
Please do not get a loan with Sallie Mae. They have destroyed my life and countless other lives with their predatory business practices and horrible treatment and harassment toward their borrowers.
I created a change.org petition to stop Sallie Mae because they have circumvented legal recourse for their actions long enough and its disgusting at this point, every signature helps:
https://chng.it/KmmChtrd4J
I just spoke to them today about the way they have treated my elderly grandmother and cosigner, because they have harassed her with calls that have alarmed her, insinuating that she owes something on a loan that hasn't even matured yet. They called up to 4 times a day and even estranged family members who I have never been associated with.
After months of inducing unsurmountable stress and anxiety in me and my grandmother, they admitted they shouldn't have been calling her and apologized. They never addressed their behavior and they immediately moved to get money from me. They still called my grandmother after being sent a cease and desist email and spoke to the consumer advocacy and they said they removed her, because it appears Sallie Mae knows they can circumvent the law. So their actions and the detriment to mine and my grandmother's wellbeing they caused had no consequence for them.
During all this harassment I am still in school and I lost my job. Just today I explained this and tried to defer my loan payments and they tried to tell me that I don't qualify because it says my course is part time. It is a part time masters program and that is the program they approved me in for the loan, that is not an enrollment status I chose, the program itself is called a professional part time masters because it involves distance learning and is structured differently.
They truly are a loan shark disguised in a shiny 'reputable' wrapping thanks to the broad scope of schools they are willing to cover. But they don't have any integrity, they will approve heinous loan terms to charge someone amounts knowing they can never feasibly pay, in my case someone with no income on government benefits (my grandmother). Their finance charges are absolutely absurd. The finance charge for one of my loans is nearly double what I borrowed (JUST the finance charge). That amount was justified by a cosigner they required, who is an elderly senior citizen with zero income and has been on government aid for years.
I am assuming they can get away with this because they have monopolized private student loans. Since I didn't qualify for a federal loan for my program/school (this seems to be the case with a lot of overseas schools) you have no choice but to take a Sallie Mae loan. A lot of these schools even say on their website the only private student loan option is Sallie Mae. So you are financially entrapped to accept whatever loan terms they put in front of you. They then harass you, drive you insane through incessant phone calls, texts, etc. with no regard for the mental or physical anguish they cause you.
They will absolutely set you up to fail - I know Im not the first and I won't be the last, there are a ton of stories from people who cannot get out of debt with Sallie Mae because they purposely set them up with egregious terms knowing that the person will never be able to pay it off and get out from under. They basically financially entrap you,
Please do not fall for their trap. Please do not put yourself in this position. They don't care if they harm vulnerable populations like the elderly. They don't care about how they treat their borrowers.
Does Sallie Mae Bank do a Chexsysyems inquiry for a new customer? (My report is fine. I am just try to keep down the number of inquiries). Thanks
Horrible company, customer service does not know what they are talking about. I called them 5 times to ask if I needed to make a payment while I was in school, every time I called they told me that I did not need to make a payment and they were clearing it up on their end. Sixth time I called, all of a sudden, I do need to make a payment, plus the late fees that they tacked on while they were telling me no payment was needed. And then, on top of that, the customer service lady claimed that the first person I talked to told me I “did” have to make a payment. A COMPLETE lie. I am disgusted by them. I made the payment in full (including late fees) that day. I would’ve paid on time every month, had they had the correct training and knowledge to properly check my loan status. Incompetent and unprofessional. I have since paid the loan off in full to avoid any further business with them. They have predatory loans, my interest rate with a co-signer was 16.25%. Sallie Mae is an awful and distrustful company. I would never do business with them again. And I will steer any student I know away from them.
I tried to apply online for a Sallie Mae CD. After completing 95% of application, it asked for my bank username and password in order to "verify" the routing and acct. numbers. I chose instead to verify later and received an Application pending screen. Next day, did not receive any notification through email so called. Customer service could see all my personal data (ss#, dob, security answer) but said the application failed and I would have to reapply. When questioned why she could see all my information if the app failed, she said she cannot delete it and it would leave their system in 30 days. I think this is bad practice and don't want them handling my money.
I've been part of Sallie Mae since 12/2011 (11-1/2 years). Never really took money out. I decided to link an account with a higher rate and transfer just over $200.00 to the newly linked account. Now I only access this account from my home ISP so it should be static. Never from a mobile phone or tablet and I get his message "Your transaction for $2**.** was not executed. The transaction was cancelled for the following reason: Account Frozen
They froze my account. WTF?
If you ’trust the process' everything works great! Not being the trusting type I tried to understand the relationship between Savebetter and its listed banks. Apparently SaveBetter's custodian bank 'Lewis and Clark' maintains an account at their client banks (like SallieMae) and Savebetter deposits are aggregated to this account. So the client banks don't need to deal with many retail accounts. Savebetter then does all the customer facing work like showing account balances and processing retail transactions. They claim (taking them at their word) that the FDIC insurance passes-through if a client bank fails. I guess SaveBetter gets some money from their client banks for marketing and recordkeeping.
Overall, the process seems to work remarkably well so far given its complexity (haven't taken money out though).
Only gottcha's so far is that their is no option to collect accrued interest from CDs prior to maturity and their ChatBot while not ChatGPT quality is reasonably complete. It answered how to set a beneficiary for example. Also SaveBetter was a bit sketchy about how (the one) external bank account allowed is set or displayed. I tried getting someone with a pulse to answer a question but got music-on-hold. Be advised.
I AM A LONG TERM CUSTOMER WHO JUST WENT TO OPEN A NEW CD. I HAVE HAD MANY SALLIE CDS IN THE PAST AND FOUND THEM VERY EASY TO DEAL WITH. THEY REFUSED TO OPEN MY NEW CD ON THE PHONE. TO OPEN ONLINE WITH THE SAME JOINT OWNERSHIP AND BENEFICIARIES AS MY MMA IS CUMBERSOME AT BEST. TIME TO TRY SOMEWHERE ELSE!
I have never dealt with a more unprofessional and rude customer service team. I have communicated with them numerous times and have had had nothing but rude, condescending tones and the most unhelpful, lazy answers given to me. I have had nothing but an awful experience with these people, and their rating should reflect nothing but that. I would rather have my loan serviced through someone with a higher interest rate if it meant that I wouldn’t have to deal with this company. I have been charged incorrect interest amounts numerous times, and they have done everything they can to justify their actions without looking into the issue at hand or simply explaining how the interest was calculated or when it was accrued. This is the worst student loan servicer out there, and I could not recommend them less.
After opening the CD I find out that FDIC insurance is only valid on the individual maximum amount. Usually i add a beneficiary to give another 250k in FDIC coverage. Savebetter makes their own rules on ONLY INSURING THE ACCOUNT HOLDER. Had it been known prior i would have done things differently. If you are concerned about insuring your account fully AVOID SAVEBETTER...they make their own rules and give you no help !!
I invested in a Sallie Mae CD that is only available through SaveBetter.com. Their website doesn't work. I've tried calling them on the phone, but no one answers the phone. I really regret my decision.
The issue I have with savebetter is that you CAN NOT get the interest as it posts to the CD. If the CD is short term 3-6-9-12 months might be OK for some people. If long term it is sort of a zero-coupon bond.
I have had CDs with Sallie Mae in the past and had no issues at all. It was easy and a positive experience. I had to search a bit to find the 27 month 5% CD but I found it! And signed up. Fingers crossed that it is as easy as last time. So far it definitely seemed easy and quick. Thank you again, Sallie Mae!
Been with this bank for 10+ years now. Never had any issues. Nice customer service, good rates and easy deposits and withdrawals. They could do with a much upgraded website like so many banks do but I am guessing this could all be due to security issues. As long as they keep my money safe I am fine with it!
The bank cannot generate the online savings account statements for the month of June 2022. Called the help desk. The IT people have no clue apparently because there was not time frame given for resolution. The only reason I kept this account is because they had some of the best interest rates a while back. Now they are only average. This would be one of the next bank accounts to dump if I could find a better option. The best ones are already maxed out.
I have had a money market account with Sallie Mae for several years. In the past I had no problems adding it as an externally linked account at several other banks.
However I was recently unable to link my Sallie Mae account to either Live Oak bank or Barclays bank. In both cases the test deposits never appeared in my Sallie Mae account.
I would not trust using this bank for ACH links via other institutions until Sallie Mae fixes these problems.
I was concerned about the transfer from Sallie Mae to my linked account at another bank after reading some reviews that people had trouble with this.
It worked fine for me. My CD matured on 1/2. I had given them instructions beforehand to transfer balance to the account that was used to transfer the original funds in.
I called on 1/4 (Monday) to check and they had the instructions. The funds were no longer in Sallie Mae on 1/5 and showed up in the other bank on 1/6.