Today U.S. Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos announced how the office of Federal Student Aid is executing on providing relief during the COVID-19 national emergency. As promised, here is a summary of the announcement.
All borrowers with federally held student loans may receive the following benefits effective March 13, 2020 for at least 60 days:
Summary from the Department of Education on Federal Student Loan Interest Waiver
- Interest rates set to 0%
- Ability to request an administrative forbearance to suspend their payments
- Borrowers who are more than 31 days delinquent as of March 13, 2020, or who becomes more than 31 days delinquent, may receive an automatic suspension of payment
Borrowers able to make payments should continue to do so, especially those seeking Public Service Loan Forgiveness (PSLF) in order to maintain eligibility. For borrowers continuing to make payments, the full amount of those payments will be applied to the principal balance once all accrued interest prior to March 13th is paid.
Any borrower who is experiencing a change in income should contact our concierge loan advisors. We can connect them to their servicer to optimize or postpone payments.