8666337945

So, you guys know the rules, just choose not to follow them on the phone, when you think you won't be held accountable..

As you said, you did not deal with Conserve to resolve your debt.

And when Conserve did become involved, it was only to try to scam you out of more money:
"...today I got a call from ConServe from someone asking for my husband.  She wouldn't give me any information and just hung up when I said he wasn't home, but I don't know why this company would be calling when we have already worked out a rehabilitation plan with Van Ru.  The thing is, if she refuses to talk to me nothing will happen - my husband has avoidance issues and will ignore it and hope it goes away, *I* need to handle it, and I thought I did, until this morning when ConServe called me asking for my husband."

Thank you for posting.

You must work for Conserve

it's as easy as google, check it out.

I have never had any student loans and have no idea why such a company would be calling me; also this is a brand new number so I believe this is just another scam. I am on the do not call list and will be reporting this number.

Conserve is a legit company, I was skeptical at first when I got letters and calls from them and I know I never borrowed from them..I researched and contacted department of education and they assured me my loans had been sent to conserve for collection due to being in default and they told me about options conserve could offer me to get me out of default..also when I contacted Nys taxation to see if I had any company's looking to snatch my taxes,sure enough conserve was listed and there number was giving for me to contact for further information.. so I called finally after avoiding them for about 8mths and I am now on a 10mth affordable repayment plan for $100 a month after 10 payments I will be put of default and the government will also waive most of the collection fees which I may add totaled nearly $5k extra.. so again I recommend u call and see what u can be offered...they will work with u,well at least the Guy handling mines did..with 3kids and being a single Mom..I just don't need anymore drama, I certainly can't afford them to garnish my checks or try and take my home..

If you have an actual debt, it is MUCH better to negotiate directly with the lender (Department of Education, for example) rather than them.

Do the research, they have screwed over many people.

Oh, and they can't "take" your home.  Was this one of the lies they used on you when they were trying to put you through "drama"?

You're right Bean, just google this company (or one of the many dodgy phone numbers they use) and see how they try to lie and deceive.

Thank God for the internet!

I also checked them out dept of ed confirmed it was legit and I've never been threatened by them

http://www.bbb.org/upstate-new-york/Business- ... 0116/complaints

IF you have a debt, negotiate directly with the lender.

I've been declared disabled long ago in 1993.  The government rejected the signed forms from the Doctor saying" He used a pencil to sign"  Every time I try to work I get sick, or end up in the hospital.  But according to forms sent to me by this company, I can only have it discharged if working could cause "death".  Since they changed it not long ago, being disabled and not able to work, and personally not employed, I still have to pay back on a loan that now has ballooned to 5 times what it was.  So I guess death is the answer to getting it discharged.  This from conserve.

To the person who gave an entire essay regarding ConServ & info on how  debt collector has all of our information (as if we didnt know this..) sounds like you work for them.

To the 2nd anon-- how are you homeless for 2+ years but getting phone calls and getting online to research an 800 number -_____-

866-633-7945 called a friend of my son, a teenager (lets call him Bob) who posts on facebook about his nonregistered future company name regarding video editing and they said that either I or my son (who is 17) applied for a job and had listed his video editing company as a reference????  And then asked them about me and my son.  Now, if they were a ligit debt collector regarding student loans, then they would have my phone number and contact information, yet they tried to get his personal information then my contact information?????  I would never list a teenagers facebook page as a reference????  They only thing we can think of was that the night before they started calling "Bob" I had "liked" a post that he posted on facebook.  We do not know if they are trying to get info on Bob or my son or me?????   Either way, I am a professional working mother and do not like the idea that this company is calling my son's friends saying that I listed them as a reference for a job?????  Either way they are LIARS and are DECEITFUL.  

You read it right, I am a former employee of ConServe and am currently working for another collection agency. I have been in the industry for several years and have seen a lot of changes. Let me first start by saying that if half of you would dig a little deeper, rather than just throw an 800 number into google, you may just learn something about federal student loans. Since there are several that do not take that route, Ill give you a quick "Defaulted Student Loans for Dummies" lesson and specifically focus on the collection industry that services defaulted loans.

First and foremost, ConServe is in no way a scam. They are a very successful collections company based out of Fairport NY and have been named a top 100 company in the city of Rochester NY. Additionally they have back to back years ranked as the "best place to work in collections" by InsideArm. Several of you have mentioned to skip working with an agency and work straight with the lender (which would be the US Department of Education referred to as ED not to be confused with DOE which is Department of Energy).  This may be an option in other areas of collections, but not with ED. If you are unsure about this and don't believe me feel free to call ED at 800-621-3115. If you have defaulted loans with them and have been assigned to an agency the ED representative will ask you if you can pay your balance in full. If you can not, you will be referred to the agency servicing the account so you can set up a payment arrangement (for a list of all agencies contracted by ED and to verify statements in this post visit EDs default resolution page at www.myeddebt.com).

Now I will address the process of collections and why you're assigned to an agency;

When you default on your loans and they are placed with ED you are notified in writing that you have defaulted and you must contact ED or they will assign you to a collection agency which may substantially increase your balance due to penalty fees. They send these letters to the address you had on file prior to defaulting (this is why it's important to keep your contact information updated with all of your loan holders). If you do not respond you are assigned to one of the collection agencies. The agency is provided with all of your personal information so they can reach out to you and give you the chance to make a payment arrangement on a voluntarily (Yes I said voluntarily and Ill cover why in a second). Once assigned to an agency you will be sent a letter, also to your last known address, advising you that your account has been assigned for collections. Additionally you will begin receiving phone calls, first to your last known personal number. Should you choose to ignore the call/phone disconnected, etc, representatives will then attempt to contact you at work. I used to constantly get told by consumers "it's illegal to contact me at work". No it is not, unless you have specifically stated that you can not receive calls at work. If you state this, you will no longer be contacted at work. Here's where it becomes a problem for 75-90% of people....

So you're all proud of yourself that you told the rep you can't be contacted at work and you either didn't provide an alternate number to reach you, ignore calls and/or don't call the representative back.  Meanwhile, the representative is required to find a resolution on your account within a reasonable amount of time (keep in mind if you are defaulted on loans that means you have not made a payment in at least 270 days). In this situation a representative would likely refer your account for administrative wage garnishment after the account has been with the agency for a month.  So what's that mean???

Your company is contacted to obtain all contact information to send a wage garnishment order. This is not like other garnishments where a court order is typically needed. ED does not need to obtain a court order to garnish a defaulted loan consumer. In addition to being extremely embarrassing (your payroll office/rep is basically sent a letter advising them that you're not responsible enough to deal with your obligations you promised you would via promissory note so they will need to forward 15% of your pay to ED until the balance is paid in full..side note, good luck getting a promotion when you can't even handle having a conversation about your student loans) it is typically much more per month than a payment arrangement would be and to top it off, you'll also end up paying penalty fees that would be forgiven after completing a payment plan.

Let me be clear that this is not the only course of action for loan recovery. There is also the treasury offset program which seizes tax returns/percentage of SSI/stimulus money etc as well as litigation where the Department of Justice will literally sue you if the representative working the account can't find any other solution to resolving the account.

Let's say you do answer the phone;  You will be asked what year you were born. This is because the rep needs to be sure they have contacted the right person. You may be asked this several different ways but typically it will go "Hi, is this Joe Smith born 1981"?  You answer yes...the representative will identify them-self as well as state the reason they're calling. They will first ask you if you're able to pay off your balance which is ridiculous but required. You will answer no. You will then be asked a series of questions regarding your household income and expenses. This is used to show why you can't pay off your full balance. Once all questions are updated you will be offered a series of options to resolve your account. There is a settlement option that is usually 90% of your principle and interest as well as the most common resolution, loan rehabilitation. Rehabilitation of your loans requires 9 on time monthly payments within a 10 month period. Once you have completed this, your loans will be current and the penalty fees remaining will be waived!  You will not have to pay them back because you decided to be an adult and take care of it!

So let's say you owe 100k in loans. Your first option will be a standard payment that is based on a 10 year payoff. Your payment would be around 1000 to 1500 a month. Problem; your household income is only 40 grand a year and you have a spouse, two kids etc and there is absolutely no way in hell you could ever afford that kind of payment. Good news...Payments under loan rehabilitation as well as current federal loans can be considered for income based repayment (see http://studentaid.ed.gov/repay-loans/understand/plans ). In this example, your payment would be roughly 60 dollars a month (YOU MUST PROVIDE PROOF of your income for this program which is typically you most recently filed tax form) and you may qualify for loan forgiveness after 20-25 years which comes out to 18000 dollars paid on a 100,000 loan!)  On the flip side, a garnishment would be roughly 400-500 a month!!  For the love of god pick up your phone and take care of this!  Believe me, these representatives do not want to garnish anybody. We all have families as well and know what kind of hardship that would create!  Reps will do a much as they possibly can to get in contact with you to avoid involuntary collections including calling third parties (ie family members, etc) if the rep hasn't been able to get in contact with you. As poor as the image of "debt collector" is, in this particular portion of the industry we really do want to help you get your situation resolved.

If you have no income (unemployed) you will also be able to resolve your loans through rehabilitation with as little as a 5 dollar payment per month.

Further, ConServe is contracted by ED...they do not purchase your loans so you're not paying them. Payments made are processed and applied to your account with ED.

After you have successfully completed loan rehabilitation you will have your remaining balance transferred to another loan servicer who will then work with you to ensure you never have to experience default again.

On a side note, do ConServe employees occasionally make mistakes and contact the wrong people?  Certainly which is why they attempt to verify who you are via your name and year of birth. Debt collectors are human, they make mistakes and working in this industry is not easy, you are constantly dealing with combative people that are only really combative because times are tough and speaking about finances is frustrating. Don't let federal student loans frustrate you, they are very easy to deal with if you just explain your situation.

Hopefully this will assist people in understanding the process.

Don't know who is servicing your federal loans?  See the National Student Loan Data System (NSLDS).

You read it right, I am a former employee of ConServe and am currently working for another collection agency. I have been in the industry for several years and have seen a lot of changes. Let me first start by saying that if half of you would dig a little deeper, rather than just throw an 800 number into google, you may just learn something about federal student loans. Since there are several that do not take that route, Ill give you a quick "Defaulted Student Loans for Dummies" lesson and specifically focus on the collection industry that services defaulted loans.

First and foremost, ConServe is in no way a scam. They are a very successful collections company based out of Fairport NY and have been named a top 100 company in the city of Rochester NY. Additionally they have back to back years ranked as the "best place to work in collections" by InsideArm. Several of you have mentioned to skip working with an agency and work straight with the lender (which would be the US Department of Education referred to as ED not to be confused with DOE which is Department of Energy).  This may be an option in other areas of collections, but not with ED. If you are unsure about this and don't believe me feel free to call ED at 800-621-3115. If you have defaulted loans with them and have been assigned to an agency the ED representative will ask you if you can pay your balance in full. If you can not, you will be referred to the agency servicing the account so you can set up a payment arrangement (for a list of all agencies contracted by ED and to verify statements in this post visit EDs default resolution page at www.myeddebt.com).

Now I will address the process of collections and why you're assigned to an agency;

When you default on your loans and they are placed with ED you are notified in writing that you have defaulted and you must contact ED or they will assign you to a collection agency which may substantially increase your balance due to penalty fees. They send these letters to the address you had on file prior to defaulting (this is why it's important to keep your contact information updated with all of your loan holders). If you do not respond you are assigned to one of the collection agencies. The agency is provided with all of your personal information so they can reach out to you and give you the chance to make a payment arrangement on a voluntarily (Yes I said voluntarily and Ill cover why in a second). Once assigned to an agency you will be sent a letter, also to your last known address, advising you that your account has been assigned for collections. Additionally you will begin receiving phone calls, first to your last known personal number. Should you choose to ignore the call/phone disconnected, etc, representatives will then attempt to contact you at work. I used to constantly get told by consumers "it's illegal to contact me at work". No it is not, unless you have specifically stated that you can not receive calls at work. If you state this, you will no longer be contacted at work. Here's where it becomes a problem for 75-90% of people....

So you're all proud of yourself that you told the rep you can't be contacted at work and you either didn't provide an alternate number to reach you, ignore calls and/or don't call the representative back.  Meanwhile, the representative is required to find a resolution on your account within a reasonable amount of time (keep in mind if you are defaulted on loans that means you have not made a payment in at least 270 days). In this situation a representative would likely refer your account for administrative wage garnishment after the account has been with the agency for a month.  So what's that mean???

Your company is contacted to obtain all contact information to send a wage garnishment order. This is not like other garnishments where a court order is typically needed. ED does not need to obtain a court order to garnish a defaulted loan consumer. In addition to being extremely embarrassing (your payroll office/rep is basically sent a letter advising them that you're not responsible enough to deal with your obligations you promised you would via promissory note so they will need to forward 15% of your pay to ED until the balance is paid in full..side note, good luck getting a promotion when you can't even handle having a conversation about your student loans) it is typically much more per month than a payment arrangement would be and to top it off, you'll also end up paying penalty fees that would be forgiven after completing a payment plan.

Let me be clear that this is not the only course of action for loan recovery. There is also the treasury offset program which seizes tax returns/percentage of SSI/stimulus money etc as well as litigation where the Department of Justice will literally sue you if the representative working the account can't find any other solution to resolving the account.

Let's say you do answer the phone;  You will be asked what year you were born. This is because the rep needs to be sure they have contacted the right person. You may be asked this several different ways but typically it will go "Hi, is this Joe Smith born 1981"?  You answer yes...the representative will identify them-self as well as state the reason they're calling. They will first ask you if you're able to pay off your balance which is ridiculous but required. You will answer no. You will then be asked a series of questions regarding your household income and expenses. This is used to show why you can't pay off your full balance. Once all questions are updated you will be offered a series of options to resolve your account. There is a settlement option that is usually 90% of your principle and interest as well as the most common resolution, loan rehabilitation. Rehabilitation of your loans requires 9 on time monthly payments within a 10 month period. Once you have completed this, your loans will be current and the penalty fees remaining will be waived!  You will not have to pay them back because you decided to be an adult and take care of it!

So let's say you owe 100k in loans. Your first option will be a standard payment that is based on a 10 year payoff. Your payment would be around 1000 to 1500 a month. Problem; your household income is only 40 grand a year and you have a spouse, two kids etc and there is absolutely no way in hell you could ever afford that kind of payment. Good news...Payments under loan rehabilitation as well as current federal loans can be considered for income based repayment (see http://studentaid.ed.gov/repay-loans/understand/plans ). In this example, your payment would be roughly 60 dollars a month (YOU MUST PROVIDE PROOF of your income for this program which is typically you most recently filed tax form) and you may qualify for loan forgiveness after 20-25 years which comes out to 18000 dollars paid on a 100,000 loan!)  On the flip side, a garnishment would be roughly 400-500 a month!!  For the love of god pick up your phone and take care of this!  Believe me, these representatives do not want to garnish anybody. We all have families as well and know what kind of hardship that would create!  Reps will do a much as they possibly can to get in contact with you to avoid involuntary collections including calling third parties (ie family members, etc) if the rep hasn't been able to get in contact with you. As poor as the image of "debt collector" is, in this particular portion of the industry we really do want to help you get your situation resolved.

If you have no income (unemployed) you will also be able to resolve your loans through rehabilitation with as little as a 5 dollar payment per month.

Further, ConServe is contracted by ED...they do not purchase your loans so you're not paying them. Payments made are processed and applied to your account with ED.

After you have successfully completed loan rehabilitation you will have your remaining balance transferred to another loan servicer who will then work with you to ensure you never have to experience default again.

On a side note, do ConServe employees occasionally make mistakes and contact the wrong people?  Certainly which is why they attempt to verify who you are via your name and year of birth. Debt collectors are human, they make mistakes and working in this industry is not easy, you are constantly dealing with combative people that are only really combative because times are tough and speaking about finances is frustrating. Don't let federal student loans frustrate you, they are very easy to deal with if you just explain your situation.

Hopefully this will assist people in understanding the process.

Don't know who is servicing your federal loans?  See the National Student Loan Data System (NSLDS).

Collectors seriously hate when you're taxes are taken for this because they don't get credit for your taxes being taken. They would prefer that your taxes aren't taken so they can refer your account to DOJ for litigation.

Call ED 800-621-3115

You have no idea what you are saying. The collection agency's initiate garnishments, meaning they tell ED that the consumer was too stubborn to set up a payment arrangement so ED needs to send a letter to the payroll office to start garnishing. Whatever agency is servicing the loan gets credit for every single payment that is garnished. Stop posting bs when you have clearly never worked in the field.

When your loan is placed with an agency the agency gets credit for every single payment made on the loan even if you call Dept of Ed directly.