Key Student Loan Dates And Deadlines For Remainder Of 2024

Student loan borrowers have been facing chaos in the last few months with changes to repayment plans, forbearances due to court cases, and more. But there are important deadlines coming up that borrowers need to be aware of regardless of what happens with the SAVE plan or related forgiveness programs.

f you have federal student loans to pay back and you’re wondering what to expect for the remainder of the calendar year, here are a few key student loan deadlines to know about.

Fresh Start Program Ends September 30, 2024

The Fresh Start Program was part of the US Department of Education’s Covid-19 relief for federal student loans. This program was created to help borrowers with loans in default get back on track with a “fresh start”, by not only getting their loans back on track, but also helping improve their credit.

Those who enrolled in the Fresh Start program saw the following happen with their loans:

• Defaulted federal student loans were moved from the Default Resolution Group (or from a guaranty agency) to a loan servicer.
• Defaulted loans were moved to “in repayment” status.
• Records of default were removed from consumer’s credit reports.
• Eligible borrowers were placed on standard, 10-year repayment for their loans with the option to enroll in an income-driven repayment plan.

Other benefits of Fresh Start included renewed access to federal student loans, stopped collection calls, eligibility for other government loans, and restored ability to rehabilitate loans.

Borrowers can still apply for Fresh Start through September 30, 2024, when the program is scheduled to end. This page on the US Department of Education website explains the details of the Fresh Start program and how borrowers can enroll while there’s still time.

Student Loan “On-Ramp” Ends September 30th

The student loan on-ramp period that was put in place due to the pandemic is set to end on September 30th. This on-ramp is essentially the amount of time borrowers who haven’t been repaying their loans have to get their act together.

“The Department is instituting a 12-month “on-ramp” to repayment, running from October 1, 2023 to September 30, 2024, so that financially vulnerable borrowers who miss monthly payments during this period are not considered delinquent, reported to credit bureaus , placed in default, or referred to debt collection agencies,” according to a White House fact sheet.

This means borrowers unable or unwilling to repay their federal student loans will soon face consequences they haven’t for a while, including seeing their loans return to collections, facing wage garnishments, tax offsets, and more.

Possible Government Shutdown

The government could shutdown on October 1, 2024 if Congress doesn’t pass funding bills. If the government does shut down, there are several things that could impact student loan borrowers. However, making your loan payments is not one of them.

If the government does shut down, loan payments are still due by their required due date. Furthermore, since most aspects of your student loans are handled by loan servicers, many functions will process as normal, since the loan servicers are private companies that won’t shut down.

However, any activity that requires the Department of Education to sign off on, including loan consolidation and loan forgiveness approvals, will be paused. That means borrowers who are already waiting in limbo will have to wait longer.

Lawsuits Blocking SAVE Plan Could Resolve Soon

Many borrowers repaying loans on the Saving On a Valuable Education (SAVE) income-driven repayment plan are left wondering what’s next since a federal court issued an injunction preventing the US Department of Education from implementing large parts of the plan.

Borrowers who enrolled in the plan currently have their loans in forbearance as they wait for lawsuits to work their way through the court system. Fortunately, payments on the SAVE plan are not due during this time, and interest won’t accumulate on unpaid loan amounts.

“Borrowers will be in this forbearance until the legal situation changes or servicers are able to send bills to borrowers at the appropriate monthly payment amount,” writes the US Department of Education.

The first major hearing on the SAVE plan is scheduled for October 25, 2024, with ruling expected in November. However, that ruling could still be appealed to the Supreme Court.

While some experts believe SAVE lawsuits will be resolved by the end of 2024, others believe we won’t have any answers until 2025 at the earliest. Regardless, borrowers on the SAVE plan with loans in forbearance need to keep their ears open for news regarding these lawsuits and their final outcome. If the SAVE plan is ultimately implemented, they should eventually be able to repay their loans with the monthly payment and plan they agreed to when they enrolled. If not, they would likely need to select a new student loan repayment plan altogether.

What About Biden’s Newest Student Loan Forgiveness Plan?

As if the student loan landscape wasn’t complicated enough, the Biden administration began sending out emails in August about a new, much more targeted student loan forgiveness plan set to launch later this year. This plan aimed to use the regulatory process instead of executive action, and it would impact more than 25 million Americans with federal student loan debt.

A Dept. of Education press release on the plan said it would:

• Forgive some student debt for borrowers who now owe more on their federal student loans than when they started repayment
• Forgive debt from undergraduate loans when the borrower has been making payments for 20 years or more
• Forgive debt for borrowers who have at least one graduate student loan when they have made payments for 25 years or more
• Erase student debt for some borrowers who would be eligible for student loan forgiveness if they applied
• Provide forgiveness for borrowers who attended certain low-value institutions of higher education

“Today, the Biden-Harris administration takes another step forward in our drive to deliver student debt relief to borrowers who’ve been failed by a broken system,” said US Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona in a press release on the plan..

Not surprisingly, a US District Judge blocked the initial implementation of this plan on September 5th, 2024, which automatically put it in limbo. The next hearing on this case is scheduled for later in September, and borrowers could be left waiting to hear about the legality of this plan until later this year or well into 2025.

The Bottom Line

For borrowers who haven’t resumed making payments, or have loans in default, now is the time to take action. The September 30th deadline is fast approaching, and it’s essential you take action.

With so much up in the air at the moment, all any of us can do is wait and see. Unfortunately, some of the key student loan dates to watch out for may not happen until the end of 2024, or even next year.