As a previous student of Brown Mackie university, there are a couple of U.S. Government programs you can utilize to get student loan forgiveness and even possibly qualify for a refund.
These two programs are called the Closed School Loan Discharge Program and Borrower’s Defense To Repayment (BDAR). I can ensure you that these are solid chances to wipe out your student loans, and, in fact, they’re two of the best Federal Student Loan Forgiveness Programs on the suggestion.
In this post, I’ll describe how each of those programs works, plus going through each program’s eligibility conditions, and also how to write a reasonable application to improve your chances of being accepted for a discharge.
Table of contents
The Brown Mackie College Lawsuit
The US Justice Department announced a $95.5 settlement toward Brown Mackie’s parent company, Education Management Corporation, in 2015.
The origin of this lawsuit and lawsuit settlement was rooted in EMC performing various numbers of fraudulent conduct, especially tied to how they announced their Brown Mackie College.
In fact, it’s essentially a fictitious advertising state, where the school made misleading promises or fake claims to attract students into taking out loans to tend their higher education programs on the idea that they were more important than they really were.
In the lawsuit, EMC was involved in using tricky, high-pressure recruiting tactics to create more enrollments. As a result of the arrangement, each one of EMC’s schools was elected an independent administrator to monitor selection and enrollment practices securing that the unlawful marketing actions would stop.
Two Ways to Discharge Brown Mackie College Loans
As I stated, there are two loan forgiveness programs open for past Brown Mackie students, the Closed School Loan Discharge program and the Borrower’s Defense To Repayment program.
Since you can’t utilize both programs at once, you have to read through the information that I’ve presented here very accurately and pick the program that gives you the strongest possibility of reaching student loan forgiveness.
Let’s examine how both of these programs work so that you can choose which one will be suitable for your situation.
Discharging Brown Mackie Loans via Borrower’s Defense Against Repayment
The Borrower’s Defense Against Repayment Program was created to assist students in eliminating student loans that never should have been in the first place because students borrowed the money based on tricks or frauds.
The idea past students of Brown Mackie are eligible to have their student loans discharged by the Borrower’s Defense Program is that the school was confirmed to have performed fraudulent marketing action and made to pay the $95.5 million settlement I stated above.
Because the school was connected with this enormous lawsuit settlement, and because other past students of Brown Mackie have already had their loans discharged, there’s an exemplar for getting yours forgiven as well.
But here’s the most crucial thing you must know if you want to manage the Borrower’s Defense claim to make your student loan discharged. In your BDAR application, you have to link your request to the $95.5 settlement, explaining that you are one of the people Brown Mackie defrauded and that your loan was just formed because you believe them for their false marketing information.
The big news is that if you follow my guidance and you fill out the Borrower’s Defense application accurately, then your loan servicer will essentially be required to accept your application for a discharge. Thus, you can leave from the excellent loan balance without having to pay another cent!
If everything goes well according to plan, you will have a great possibility of not only getting rid of your student loan burden but also of getting a refund for whatever payments you’ve already made against the Brown Mackie debt.
How to Write Your Borrower’s Defense Claim
The essential thing you have to do with your BDAR application is to stress that Brown Mackie did something that they shouldn’t have done and that they did it to you individually.
You have to explain that Brown Mackie did fraud against you by misleading you about the price of their higher education programs and making assurances that they couldn’t keep.
Then, you must emphasize the fact that you would never have allowed to take out a student loan to serve Brown Mackie had you not been lied to and that it was simply because of the lies they told you that you thought it was a good idea to borrow money to attend the school.
In other words, you have to explain that Brown Mackie assured you that their program was the greatest thing ever and that you were going to be able to receive a big job upon graduation, and that you wouldn’t have taken out the student loan to attend their school had Brown Mackie not involved in fraudulent business works against you, individually.
A $95.5 settlement facing the school will make it simple for you to show that you were a sufferer of fraud. But, it isn’t enough to only point out that the school got into a problem with the law.
In addition, you must be explicit about what the school did to you individually that encouraged you to take out the loan, which indicates you have to share some features about what was said, assured, described, etc.
Let’s look now at what particular types of fraudulent action the school was engaged in that ended in the $95.5 settlement. As you read within the list of things they were shown to have done, reflect about whether or not they made any of these points to you.
If you did undergo any of the following illegal actions, then your student loan should be forgiven by BDAR, and you absolutely should apply ASAP.
What Fraudulent Activity has Brown Mackie Been Accused Of?
They are involved in false, fraudulent, and misleading business practices. This is why there was a $95.5 compensation against the school.
But it’s not enough to aim this out on the Borrower’s Defense application because while you should state that you’re informed, they got in trouble with the law. There was a massive settlement facing them. You must claim that they did this to you, especially individually.
Here’s the list of particular illegal marketing actions that Brown Mackie allegedly did:
- They were using incentive-based compensation to pay their recruiters based on the number of students they enrolled, essentially treating them like salespeople.
- The more Brown Mackie’s recruiters registered (i.e., sold), the more money they got. This affected recruiters to use the kind of forceful sales tactics usually seen in used car dealerships.
- They misrepresented the quality of their academic programs. They told students that they wouldn’t have any difficulty getting a good job upon graduation, which they had no sign to confirm was true.
- They increased their graduation rates to make it look like the school enrolled only the most qualified candidates, far from accurate, as Brown Mackie enlisted anyone who could qualify to borrow enough money for their tuition.
Does any of this sound close?
If you directly experienced any of these illegal marketing actions, then you should qualify for a student loan discharge, and you must fill out the BDAR application quickly to guarantee that you’ll be placed in line for consideration.
Where Can I File My Borrower’s Defense Claim?
You can use the Borrower’s Defense To Repayment program by going to the official US government website.
This site offers a genius that will lead you through the application process, but if you want to read the information before, click “View Form” at the bottom of the link above.
Don’t register a claim anywhere else! Unfortunately, there are all kinds of scammers floating around who insist they can assist you in filing a BDAR Discharge Application, facilitating the process, guaranteeing you’ll be accepted, etc. Still, you don’t need anyone’s assistant with this, as it can all be done entirely on your own.
Checking The Status of My Application
The Borrower’s Defense requests are taking quite some time to process, and I’ve received comments from many people who insisted they’d been waiting over a year to get any reply from the Department of Education.
But, do not allow that to stop you from utilizing for a BDAR Discharge because if you meet the eligibility conditions, you will get your loans discharged. It’ll just take a while to get through the permissions process.
But you have to implement right away, because our Secretary of Education (Betsy DeVos) has been struggling to end this program down since she first took up her position at the Department of Education, and she is the reason why it’s taking so much longer to get an answer on BDAR Applications.
While she may successfully stop the program at any point soon, if your BDAR Application was presented before that period, you should be grandfathered into the program and get approval for discharge even if they shut the shop, so be certain to get your app in right away!
Private Student Loan Consolidation
Private student loan consolidation is available through various banks to combine all your student loans into one new loan. Private student loan consolidation requires a good credit score and will often have better rates than the federal student loan.
How Do I Apply for a Closed School Discharge?
Closed School Loan Discharge program is simple for applying.
All you have to do is download the application, fill it out, and present it to your loan servicer, who will later lead you through the remainder of the process.
If you’re not informed, your loan servicer is the organization who you transfer your monthly student loan payments to.
Every loan servicer has a somewhat mixed method of processing these Closed School applications, so I can’t tell you precisely what you’ll have to do after submitting your paperwork.
But your loan servicer is committed by law to describe that process to you and to support you through it to guarantee you get the loan discharge that you earn.
Eligibility Requirements for Closed School Discharges
You would qualify for a Closed School Loan Discharge if you were studying at Brown Mackie when it shut.
You would also qualify for discharge if you studied at Brown Mackie within 120 days before the school closed.
The only conditions that could prevent you from qualifying for the discharge would be if you already shifted your Brown Mackie credits to some other University or if you finished all the elements of your degree program before the school closed down.
If you meet these specifications, then you should unquestionably apply for the Closed School Loan Discharge program because you’re essentially assured of getting approved for forgiveness.
How Do I Apply for a Closed School Discharge?
Closed School Loan Discharge program is simple for applying.
All you have to do is download the application, fill it out, and present it to your loan servicer, who will later lead you through the remainder of the process.
If you’re not informed, your loan servicer is the organization to transfer your monthly student loan payments.
Every loan servicer has a somewhat mixed method of processing these Closed School applications, so I can’t tell you precisely what you’ll have to do after submitting your paperwork.
But your loan servicer is committed by law to describe that process to you and to support you through it to guarantee you get the loan discharge that you earn.
Which Program is Better? Closed School Discharges or Borrower’s Defense?
Both of them are good programs in that each can get rid of your prominent student loan debt and also has the potential of refunding the money you’ve already paid on your loans, but I would lean to using the Closed School Loan Discharge if you qualify for both programs.
Borrower’s Defense Applications are just taking too long to process. Because the permissions process for BDAR claims it is moderately subjective: it’s based on satisfying whoever gets your application that you do earn the discharge because you were lied to.
You don’t have to assure anyone of anything with the Closed School Loan Discharge, other than that you were a student of Brown Mackie’s within 120 days of their end, so it’s essentially a yes or no question rather than a personal thing.
Considering that you are one of the fortunate few people who qualify for each discharge program, I recommend you first try the Closed School Discharge simply because you seemingly won’t have to wait as long. Your chances are much better at getting the approval to come through.
Eventually, the decision is up to you though.
Will I Owe Taxes on Forgiven Debt?
Sadly, you will have to pay taxes on whatever sum of money settles up being forgiven.
Forgiven student loan debt is estimated taxable income by the IRS, and the worst part of their laws on forgiveness isn’t only that you have to pay taxes on the sum forgiven, but that you have to pay it all at once in a single, lump-sum payment.
Let’s consider that you use one of the two programs I’ve reviewed here to discharge $100,000 of student loan debt. If your taxable income rate is 30%, then you’ll end up owing the IRS $30,000, and they’ll require you to pay that all at once!
No one I know has that sort of money lying around, particularly people who are having difficulty making their monthly student loan payments, so I’m reasonably sure that this will build a huge problem for most borrowers who get forgiveness.