What Happens If I Don’t Make a Payment?

MOHELA will attempt to contact you regarding your account to bring it current. We will provide you with information regarding available repayment plans and options to help you lower or postpone your payment. If you make your payment late, you may be charged a fee. The U.S. Department of Education does not assess fees for late payment of Federal Direct Loans. Your delinquency may also be reported to all nationwide consumer reporting agencies.

Note that even if you are enrolled in Auto Debit, if you miss any required manual payment before the automatic withdrawals begin, your account can become past due.

If you don’t make your student loan payment or make your payment late, your loan may eventually default.  See Options to Prevent Default.

Consequences of Delinquency During On Ramp Period

Normally if you miss three monthly payments, your loan(s) would be considered delinquent and reported to the national credit reporting agencies. However, the U.S. Department of Education has created a temporary on-ramp period to support you as you start or restart payments following the pandemic pause. As part of the on-ramp, if you miss too many payments, we will apply a forbearance to your student loan account for the payments you missed.

Here’s what this means:

• Your account will no longer be considered delinquent and will be made current.

• We will not report you as delinquent to credit reporting companies, but we do not control how credit reporting companies treat missed or late payments.

• Your loans are not being sent to collection agencies.

However, interest has accrued during these months of missed payments and your monthly payments may increase to account for the accrued interest.