I called up USA Group to harrass them a bit about their EAGLE computer system, which allows your account to still report outstanding balances to credit bureaus when the account is coded as paid. They answered the phone as "Sallie Mae." When I asked about it it turned out that USA Group and Sallie Mae have merged, which is totally amazing since USA Group is the biggest student loan guarantor and Sallie Mae is, well, you know.
Re: Sallie Mae merged with USA Yep, they did it about 2 months ago. Right after I got my accounts out from under their clutches. Marci
Re: Sallie Mae merged with USA Yeah and its still the same b.s. Almost the first thing out of their representave darlene's mouth was, "collection charges are assessed by the Dept. of Education." Heh. Wrong. Collection charges are assessed by the guarantor. In my case NELA charged me 31.13% followed by another 18.5%. Of course, she put me on hold for a long time, then refused to answer my question about how accounts are coded in their system. What it tells you is, they know what they are doing is dirty, sneaky, and deceptive. Otherwise, they would just tell me what I wanted to know about their system.