Loan forms

Some of you know I'm starting grad school in the fall, after a few years break from school. One of the perks of this arrangement in the financial realm is that I can defer my student loans while I'm a student. Knowing this means more discretionary income per month, I was diligent about getting the forms ready so as soon as I was scholarly again, the bills would go away. I wouldn't normally be that concerned, but hey, it's money.

So I filled out the form, and got a student to run it over to the appropriate university office (hey, rank still has its privileges.) Then I got a letter back from the Department of Ed telling me the form was incomplete and not authorized. (At this point it was hard not to be reminded of almost every insurance reimbursement I've ever had to fill out, where the first time they always say you filled something out wrong, just so it takes longer to file the claim and get you your money, but I digress...)

So, I printed the form again, paid special attention to the fields and made sure everything I could fill out was filled out. Then I went where I was told to take it. Which wasn't the right building. Semantically, I understand where the miscommunication happened, but I'm not taking blame. Luckily, a phone call and a run to the building next door to where I thought it was landed me at the admissions office to the form approved.

The receptionist has me wait, which I do, until a counselor can see me. She calls me back, and I explain I'm there to drop off a loan deferment form - and she tells me I don't need one. Yes, gentle readers, if I would have done absolutely nothing, my loans would still have gotten deferred. She was great, explaining the process, and how financial aid keeps sending people over with the form even though it's not necessary. 10 days after the semester starts, they upload the student roster to some loan clearinghouse thing, and the feds download the active students from that, and update their records without needing those pesky paper forms. I explained the rejection letter I got, and she said because it's electronic, they don't certify them. I guess I should be lucky they mailed mine in at all.

The "I can't believe that just happened" lesson to glean from all of this. Sometimes doing nothing is the best route.