Sallie Mae To Forgive Marine's Loan Debt

Team Infidel

Forum Spin Doctor
Boston Globe
December 19, 2008
By Globe Staff
Sallie Mae, the nation's biggest provider of student loans, said yesterday that it would forgive the debts of a Marine from Weston who was killed in an accident last summer shortly before he was scheduled to be deployed to Iraq.
Officials at Sallie Mae said they learned about the plight of the family of Second Lieutenant Ian McVey in a column by Kevin Cullen published yesterday in the Globe.
McVey, 23, was killed when his motorcycle was hit by a car driven by an 84-year-old woman near Camp Lejeune, N.C., where he was awaiting deployment with the Second Combat Engineer Battalion of the Second Marine Division.
After his son's death, John McVey, a Latin teacher at The Rivers School in Weston, had written three lenders who held his son's college loans, asking them to forgive his debts.
Two lenders agreed, but Sallie Mae refused. The agency responded with a computer-generated letter that demanded that John McVey, as cosigner of the loans, pay the outstanding $53,144 debt. The letter was unsigned.
McVey said his attempts to speak to a person about the situation were thwarted by computer-generated answering machines.
Sallie Mae officials said the letter should not have been sent.
"Somebody hit the wrong button," said Tom Joyce, a spokesman for Sallie Mae. "The wrong letter was sent. Somebody should have handled this differently. It wasn't handled appropriately. We didn't live up to our service standard."
McVey said he received a call yesterday from Jack Hewes, a former Marine and Sallie Mae's chief lending officer.
"He was very gracious," McVey said. "He apologized and said it wasn't handled appropriately."
McVey said that Hewes told him he had been a Marine and understood the sacrifices military families make before adding, "Ian's debt is paid."
"I was overwhelmed with what he said, and how he said it," McVey said. "I told him all I wanted to do was be able to talk to someone who would listen."
Joyce said Sallie Mae officials were examining how they might be able to assist Ian McVey's brother, Evan, a junior at Roger Williams University who is in an officer training program and hopes to serve as a Marine pilot.
 
Back
Top