American Education Services Reviews

When I started school in 2007 I applied for financial aid. Coming from a community college financial aid meant state aid. But, apparently with the vocational school, I was tricked into signing student loans, I was young so I didn't understand. This school had no entrance exam. The student loan that was apparently the original was Barclays something and AES bought the contract I guess. Well the interest won't stop accruing. I made my payments and had it on forbearance. I could have swore it ended in October, yet they ended it in July and I found out just today I am past due and they want almost $500, I started a chat with them and they said it ended in July, they didn't seem to care. I asked what can I do since I cannot afford it, they put what seemed like a copy and past about how I should apply for a Income driven payment. I was like ok, apparently I can no longer put it in forbearance because I did it too many times.

Just found out I'm delinquent on my loans because they don't fall under the cares act. They never sent communication letting me know. They said I happened to be ahead in payments that's why it's just showing now.

American Education Services is robbing Americans of their hard-earned money. As others who have reviewed this company have noted, they are shady and provide no assistance to the borrower. I just recently found out that they do not fall under the Care Act, so during the pandemic, we did not get deferred interest even if they were federal loans. I have been out of college for almost 15 years and only borrowed $21,000 for school. I worked and got grants to supplement the cost. I have NEVER missed a payment on my loans or put them in forbearance and to this date, I have paid them $26,741.40 and $15K of that total is interest alone. They're saying I still owe them over $9K.

I had AES loans for over 27yrs. My original loan balance was $41,989.57 and additional $3,850 for 2 courses after the Master's degree. The total amount of loans at that time was $45,839.57. By the end of year 2000 the interest amount was $19,642.72 which made my total loan amount increased to $76,098.24. I paid off several of the smaller subsidized and nonsubsidized loans over the years. As years went by, I struggled to pay off loans, no matter what I paid the interest kept going. I was told in 2000 I consolidated my loans at 8.25% which I don't remember doing. My loans were in and out of forbearance and deferment since then. Now today, my loans has increased to $108,339.29. That's $62,499.71 interest added on a 45,839.58 student loan. No matter how much I have pleaded with them over the years, they simply say, "there's nothing we could do about it". These loans are designed to destroy young people rather than help.

Probably the worse thing I ever did was refinance with this shady company. Horrible company to communicate and deal with. They dont fall under the Cares Act so of course are not offering relief during the pandemic. They are semi quasi-government and hide behind that when it comes to making mistakes or lawsuits from what I hear. I hope President Biden passes the student loan payment forgiveness soon and cancels student loans and puts all of them on the unemployment line!!!! #cancelAES Cancel student loans put AES out of business!

So I get 2 emails about my credit being delinquent on Saturday morning. I pay my bills on time. My good credit destroyed over interest that I didn’t know was due. Less than 100.00. They reported on my credit report the full amount of the loan being delinquent. Interest was apparently due. No notification by mail or email. I thought student loan interest was 0% till end of year because of Covid. I can’t even create an account online my information they have isn’t correct. Can’t talk to anybody because it’s Saturday. My daughters account showing nothing due. She doesn’t even have the loan in her name and I can’t create on online account in my name. I plan on getting a loan through my bank if I can because my credit is now ruined on Monday and plan on never dealing with with company again. Shame on our PA government for allowing this company to operate.

I sent in a cashier's check for a pay off with their name as payee my information on the memo line including my account. There is no payment on my account. They can't find it which is FUNNY bc the cashier's check cleared on the 15th yet here it is the 18th and I'm being told NOW I have to prove THEY are the ones that cashed the cashier's check made out to them. That's stealing in my book. How would anyone else cash a check made out to them??? And now I have to put in MORE work to prove it. Ridiculous!!!!

I have been tracking my payments monthly for the last year, recording what the balance was before each payment and after each payment, making the payments the same day each month, being incredibly meticulous because I know this company is cheating me out of money. I just calculated everything and called customer service to ask them what their numbers were on their end. They simply do not add up. They are telling me that I have paid several hundred dollars less than I have in both payments and in interest, however they are calculating the interest does not match up with the rates on my loans.

First, this student loan servicing company does NOT fall under the CARES Act. They are a blood-sucking bank-owned company with their own rules. Sometimes they receive what you send, sometimes they don’t. Communication is poor, to say the least, unless you are late on your payments. Then, look out, robocall calls begin. They must get commissions on that. They are not helpful in helping you during tough times either. I had cancer twice and neither time did they help me with payments. Your payments DO NOT go towards the FEFL 120 payments and you’re done stuff because they are bank-owned and considered a private loan. They still report you to them though when you miss payments which risk your wages being garnished. Do yourself a favor and JUST DON’T. Stick to Federal student loans and only borrow what you absolutely must get. Pay it off ASAP. Don’t use these ya-hoos.

I received a forbearance from American Education Services until 7/31/2020. The interest continues to accumulate. The forbearance being offered by the federal government and PHEAA is until 9/30/2020 with the interest rate lowered to 0%. I inquired why AES is not offering the same terms. I was told that I do not have a federal loan. After some research I found that AES is owned by PHEAA. I also found that the CARES Act has a provision for student loans. I sent another email to AES. I am waiting for a reply.

This is the absolute worst evil and corrupt organization I have ever seen. I have been paying on my sons student loan of $61,000 since 2006 and still have $38,000 left as of May 2020. I asked for assistance due to COVID and they said I could get 3 months deferred payment with interest continuing to accrue. NOW I got a letter stating they have 'renegotiated' my loan so I have to start paying all over again with interest at 5% (not the 4.75% I originally had) and instead of paying the loan off in 10 years it will be another 16 years!!! 30 years to pay off a student loan at $320 per month! And... They don't have a phone number to actually talk with someone. You can only contact them through email. if you want to join in exploring a class action lawsuit my phone is **, Mike.

I took a loan of $20,000 back in 2003 and have pain over $40,000 on interests alone, and still owe a balance of almost $17,000. How is that possible. They keep changing the repayment terms and try so much to make it impossible for you to repay the loan. Now I looking for another loan from another source to pay off their balance and move on. I wish the government can clamp down on them and save the people. As far as I'm concerned what they are doing ought to be criminal.

I took out loans with this company back in '07, 3 disbursements, 1 at $1,334 and 2 remaining ones at $1,333 for a total of $3,999. Up till this point I had paid $4k in interest alone, so I'm not sure how I still had a bal of over 6k due, which was not going down. I recently decided to transfer this bal over to a 0% cc to try and pay it off, and as I look at my original loans totaling $3,999 and what was paid off in principal $7,582.95 (not sure how this can be) plus interest $4,707 for a total of $12,290, I'm baffled at how this company can get away with collecting over double on such a small loan. If I knew I had a chance at winning a lawsuit and having my attorney's fees awarded, I would definitely sue them. But knowing these people they most likely have a clause on their contract that I signed that prevents me as the consumer from winning the lawsuit. Anyone looking to finance their schooling, I would stay clear from this company!

I have loans with them ranging from '03-'07 when I was in school. My original borrowed amount was about 38k, I have since paid 56k back to them with a remaining balance of 47k. They have changed my interest rates over the year, making it impossible to even make a dent in this. They are horrible and take advantage of young students. After reading some other reviews, I see this is common practice for them. There really should be a lawsuit against them because they are literally just taking your money and make it impossible to get out. I am all for paying back what I borrowed with some interest, but this is ridiculous. They are like loan sharks for students. Avoid them at all costs!!!

My student loans were ASSUMED by AES from Ed South in 2003. The balance was ~ $28,000.00. I pay $225.00 each month regardless of what the 'balance due / minimum payment' request is. The amount due is typically between $50.00 and $75.00. I have made this payment each month since 2003 MINUS the two years I went back for my Masters and 2 years of personal illness. Taking into account interest accruals +/- monthly payments, let's say my balance went up to $31,000.00.

I always pay early on my student loans, as soon as I get the bill. I pay the same amount every month (which they have verified numerous times is more than what I owe each month) and somehow every month I have a past due balance of $3 or $5 because "I didn't allocate where my payment should go in the system correctly."

I was deployed to Iraq in 2010 and called you to help me out with my loan as I would be deployed for a year and did not have the ability to make payments consistently. Great news you said as we offer any military member special services that will help them while they serve our country. THAT WAS A HUGE LIE! You charged daily interest on my account taking my 9,000 loan and making it 15,000 because of the accrued interest. So now I'm paying more on a loan than when I took it out all because you promised a veteran they would be taken care of. Screw this company! Take my advice and steer clear from them!

I have had to deal with this company for many years. I recently refinanced. I have had multiple issues with their payment system reporting the wrong amounts due, me paying, and they still show a few dollars due. They have had to correct incorrectly reported late payments twice after I had to go through all the trouble of protesting the, and providing documentation. They have embarrassed me by calling my references when payments were not truly late. They would not refi, and I paid them tens of thousands of dollars in interest for eight years because I couldn't refi. They are not a good company to work with. There are much better options out there now. At the time, this was the only option. Look elsewhere, online will give you many options. They don't want to help you, they only want your money.

I had a student loan managed through American Education Services (AES). During my time paying off my loan through AES's website with consistent early, on time payments I was greeted with a message within my dashboard that stated I was no longer eligible for the Borrower Benefits Program (BBP) due to two late payments. A review of my bank statements reveals this not only to be a mistake on their end but that I made my payments a business week early and paid above the minimum required. Attempting to resolve this through their support services failed and remission of my bank statements proving the payment dates in question did nothing to change this outcome.

I’m just yet another one of these stories. Took my loan out in 2007 for just over $16k, here we are 12 years later and I still owe over $17k. I’ve paid $5k towards principal and $12k towards interest. They were supposed to have removed my co-signer after a couple years of good payments (always been paid on time) and yet they’re still stuck on this loan with me! So here I am drowning in a debt to keep my credit good, but also my co signers who should have already been removed! Who has a lawsuit already against them? Has anyone spoken to Lawyer? Something isn’t right here!!

My husband started paying on his AES Student Loan in 2004. His starting loan was $57k, today in 2019 AES shows we still owe $34k. I added up the total amount of money we have paid on this since the beginning and total we have paid this company $59k. The interest rate has gone up and very seldom down. Our payments have ranged between $250-$600 per month. A couple examples of how payments are broken down are: Payment $488.06 of that, $403.48 is interest and $84.58 is principal. Payment $600 of that,$526.69 is interest and $73.31 is principal.

I have been trying to pay off my loan for weeks now. I get messages saying they returned my payment because it was rejected by my financial institution (PNC). I have spoke with PNC two times now and they say they never received any payments, or have never rejected anything. That something is wrong on AES end. I have called AES and customer support does not know what's going on. I have been placed on hold numerous times and transferred to multiple people. No one knows the answer. I'm basically stuck. And to kick it off, Every single day $1.25 is added to my loan through interest. So I am now on day 20 since I've tried paying off the loan. That is an extra $25 so far.

I have never borrowed from this company. I am 80 years old. I had a neighbor across the street some 20 years ago who apparently had a student loan from AES. I vaguely remember him. He lived across the street from me for three years. According to AES he recently died. I would guess he would have been in his 50s when he was my neighbor. Today, I received a letter from AES telling me they were sorry for MY loss (I hardly knew him), but that I need to pay off his student loan(s)! They told me I MAY be eligible for a partial or full discharge, IF I provide them with his death certificate. WHAT???? These people are insane!

This is one of the most difficult and dishonest organizations to work with. PLEASE DO NOT GIVE THEM YOUR MONEY. I have been struggling for two years to get them to realize that I am still in school and they continue to send me bills every semester for my student loans. I repeatedly call them, email forms, mail forms, fax forms, have my school call them, etc. etc. and every semester the same issue happens. It is unbelievable. I just got off the phone with them for two (2!!) hours trying to figure this out and basically they just say it's not their problem if they don't have the right documentation and so I have to fix it on my end. Even though I have paper and electronic verification of the multiple times I have sent in my Enrollment Verification Certificate and I would be happy to send it in again. For the love of all that is holy, stay away from AES.

I am not surprised to read about so many other reviews of the terrible customer service of AES. Had login trouble getting into my account this morning, so I called later in the day to get help. Three different reps told me they needed an account password to verify my account. I have no idea what they're talking about. For the past four years, I've consistently paid my bill every month on time and never had a problem with the website until today. They tell me I need to send in a request in writing to fix the password issue. Really? I gave them my full date of birth and SS number and still they can't verify it without this stupid password. I don't even remember setting this up. Most "normal" companies can easily verify your identity with a SS number to resolve these issues except for AES. Anyone reading this, spread the word about AES.

It's bad enough that they raise your interest rates to whatever rate they want whenever they want, but they are difficult to work with, their customer service persons are not only unhelpful, they are rude on top of it (this included their online chat persons as well. If you have a question they treat you like you're an idiot and make it almost impossible to make a change on your account. If you pay a bill the day it's due, be prepared to get a phone call. If it's due on say the 10th, and you process your payment on their website on the 8th or 9th, even though your payment is EARLY, they will start harassing you with phone calls because their system takes 3 days minimum to process the payment on their end.

I deeply hate AES. I hope they go bankrupt. I was told that my aunt who agreed to be my cosigner will be crossed out of the student loan after 4 years of consecutive payments on time. It’s been 10 years and AES still refuses to take her off. I didn’t miss a single payment and paid more than what I was supposed to. They discriminate against me because I am Canadian. They cannot accept any credit information other than from USA. I sent them multiple documents but none of them works because their bureaucrats have issues when someone does not have USA social security number. Now my aunt wants to buy a house and she cannot 'cause she has my loan on her name. Thank you AES for putting me in this situation.

Allowed my daughter to only pay interest on loan for 10 years w/o consulting me!! Now she defaults and I owe full amount!!!! So I paid!! Now they owe me 'cause payoff was wrong and say 30 days? Total POS company! RUN!!!

Having 2 loans through this company. Had both loans switched to same due date. After a forbearance, they decide to change my dates back to original due dates (2 separate dates). I went to pay my bill on the phone and requested to switch my dates switched back. The customer service said gladly. Few days later got an email saying I was denied due to no signature. Ok?!

This company guarantor or whatever.. is inept (or they are inept). I've been dealing with this company for OVER A YEAR for a teacher forgiveness application. Unless you call, they do not let you know what you need or not need for the application. Always telling you "you are missing ... " Once you send it, unless you call, you will not know they actually received it. After they receive what they said they were missing, magically when you call again, you need something else. IF I COULD GIVE NEGATIVE STARS I WOULD! THE CUSTOMER SERVICE IS HORRIBLE! THEY DO NOT WANT TO APPROVE ANYTHING!

Got misinformation when I called - more than once - to ask if I needed to consolidate my loans again to qualify for the Public Service loan forgiveness program. I was ASSURED that I didn't need to do that. That ultimately cost me $54,000 and 7.5 years of payments toward the program. Now instead of 2.5 years of payments, I have to start over: TEN MORE YEARS. Pretty much says it all.

This is the fifth year in a row that AES has not processed my IBR request in a timely manner. Every year I go and do the recertification process, enter the codes on all the websites and follow up with them. Every year they send me a denial letter and then take take three times the amount out of my account stating that without the plan this is the recalculated amount. Nobody ever calls me to let me know, it's a letter in the mail after the fact. It takes 10 phone calls from me to get things straighten out. They have the worst customer service I have ever dealt with. Again, this year my wife and I did everything on our end and they said we didn't and or it wasn't in a timely manner. I took screenshots of everything when completed, so I know it is them screwing up.

AES is nothing but a ripoff loan company. They claim that the rise of the interest rate has to do from a bank from Europe. What does Europe have to do with the damn loans? I had to consolidate my current loans to beat this unjust variable rate. Stay away from this greedy loan management company! Look for the following private and federal school lenders and consolidators that have fixed rates. Earnest, Sofi, and Commonbond.

I pay this loan for my daughter because she is paying other school loans and would break emotionally if she knew how much this is per month. I sent an email about interest going up again and they use some lawyer terms that it is based on the United Kingdom Interest Rates. Really? This is America not London. I'm over 60 and may never get her loan paid off. How about blanket forgiveness for school loans? She is already in one plan for 20 years, is a long way off plus can't find a decent job that pays more than $10.00 an hour with a Masters in Education.

My main advice to anyone who is thinking of joining or leaving AES is to look closely and weigh out their 3 repayment options on their website. There is no manageable way to pay down your loan, without paying an equal or greater amount in interest. I took out 4 private student loans beginning in 2005 to help meet the costs of my tuition (as a self-supporting 18 and 19 year old). AES bought my student loans from my original borrowing company, which was a company called Student Loans Xpress. When the 2008 crash hit, AES picked up the bill on the now-defunct Student Loan Xpress company. I signed a new promissory note with them while I was still completing my degree and amidst the chaos of the financial crash, when the impact was not yet known. Ever since then, I have been stuck with them.

In 1999 I began paying back a $22,000 total student loan amount. After 10 years I was informed they were bought out by another company (AES-PHEAA) and my interest shot up to 13%! I paid a lump sum of $5000 to get my repayment interest down to only 8%. I have paid $370 per month since then... Most months I have rounded up to an even $400. So 20 years later, these clowns still will not give me any information. How much I have paid, interest, anything. It's absurd!

AES reported a payment delinquency to all 3 credit agencies and but have now failed to report my payments, so my credit score continues to drop as the agencies believe I am still delinquent. I was told reporting would take place at the end of last month and nothing has been reported. Not only is this shady and disgusting and lazy, it’s also in violation of the law. This company needs to be held accountable.

Someone seriously needs to look into this company. I took out 16,000 in student loans in 2002. Here we are in 2019 and they decided to charge me 11,000 in interest. How is this even legal??? I’m not paying another cent.

Many of these posts are accurate. You will most definitely be in a constant cycle of repayment with no end in sight. I have just made my payoff amount with my tax refund and the total I have paid them was at least double the original loan amount. Such a ripoff. I wish I knew this back before I ever took out a private school loan or at least early on in re-payment so I could have at least paid it off years earlier. Please no one do this.

This company is useless. They never have answers for simple questions. When you call and speak to someone it's like speaking to a 1st grader. The only thing they're good at is adding interest. When you question them about anything they never have an answer and more times than not, they won't respond. This company is corrupt and only contributes to the broken student loan system. They don't follow the same rules as the government even for government back student loans.