Great Lakes Educational Loan Services, Inc., Madison, WI

All $30,000 of my loans came out of forbearance last September, and I've now made 9 monthly payments with Great Lakes, going on 10. I'm signed up for automatic withdrawal payments, so my monthly payment just comes right out of my account. I get a text message alert a few days before the transaction goes through, so I can check and make sure my account is ready to have that money come out. I have one other loan that is serviced directly by my alma mater, and the university charges me a convenience charge for this. Not so for Great Lakes. I called in last fall to make sure I was in the correct repayment plan to fit my current financial situation. My phone call went right through, with no labyrinth of phone menu options to wade through. I got right through to a rep who was friendly, knowledgeable, and answered all of my questions. I felt I just needed to put a review here to counter all of the negative reviews of Great Lakes. As long as you ahem, read your promissory note when you take out your loans, there really should be no surprises. Great Lakes is a loan service provider--they just manage the loan's repayments. The Department of Education (or private credit company) is the one who issued it, and the student--and/or her parents--is the one who agreed to the terms.

I had poor internet connection while using the app in a restaurant to make a payment and the app closed. I figured it timed out since the connection was slow. So I logged in a couple days later to try paying again when I didn’t see a payment hit my account or an email confirming that I had scheduled a payment. So I tried making the payment again. This morning I wake up to my account, strictly for budgeting bills, was overdrawn. This never happens as the account is only touched by billing accounts not purchases. So I called to address the double payment that hit my account and Great Lakes told me that it will take 30-45 days to refund the one payment back to my account. Now this puts me not off budget for 3-5 business days like a normal institution would be to process a return. But a MONTH or LONGER? Are we still using a person to person hand off paper system at this institution. Absolutely ridiculous.

Do not call me at 8:30pm after I've put my 2 year old to sleep without having a representative to speak to. An automated message, then a hang up is a waste of time. Also, its absolutely RUDE to call after dinner time.

Reading all these negative reviews of Great Lakes honestly surprises me. Either I got very lucky and received amazing service, or the few people who left reviews were unlucky. I received more than excellent customer service via email and social media. The social media team at Great Lakes had a great sense of humor and was there rooting me on the whole time during the duration of my repayment process. The payments online were easily made. They do take a few business days to process the payments, but what online service doesn't? I repaid my student loans within a year! I'm proud to say I'm student loan debt free and I would recommend Great Lakes to any of my friends.

My daughter's school loans have been serviced by Great Lakes since 2018. Loan service has been great, no problems with applying payments correctly, surprise fees. Customer service has been knowledgeable and helpful, their website is comprehensive. Overall, I'm very happy with our experience.

For the second time I have been locked out of my account and unable to register for a Nelnet account. Its really frustrating to not be able to see any of your account information even though auto payments continue to be withdrawn from your bank account.

Without any notification Great Lakes has closed my account while transferring to NelNet. Their actions led to my credit score dropping 22 points and transferred balance is also incorrect, more that it should be. Moreover, I have no access to any of my statements or payment history on either site. This is borderline criminal.

All $30,000 of my loans came out of forbearance last September, and I've now made 9 monthly payments with Great Lakes, going on 10. I'm signed up for automatic withdrawal payments, so my monthly payment just comes right out of my account. I get a text message alert a few days before the transaction goes through, so I can check and make sure my account is ready to have that money come out. I have one other loan that is serviced directly by my alma mater, and the university charges me a convenience charge for this. Not so for Great Lakes. I called in last fall to make sure I was in the correct repayment plan to fit my current financial situation. My phone call went right through, with no labyrinth of phone menu options to wade through. I got right through to a rep who was friendly, knowledgeable, and answered all of my questions. I felt I just needed to put a review here to counter all of the negative reviews of Great Lakes. As long as you ahem, read your promissory note when you take out your loans, there really should be no surprises. Great Lakes is a loan service provider--they just manage the loan's repayments. The Department of Education (or private credit company) is the one who issued it, and the student--and/or her parents--is the one who agreed to the terms.