Will the government be taking more of my money?

April 29, 2008 4:46 PM

Will I be losing my stimulus check because of back student loans that I am now paying?

Basically, I was a deadbeat and didn't pay my student loans for... oh about 4 years. Yes, it was dumb. Now, I have decided to be a grownup, and two months ago started paying them after their seized my tax return. I created a schedule of payment and have not been late.

Will I be losing my stimulus check? According to the collection agency Sallie Mae uses they will no longer be going after my wages to pay this debt since I have created a payment plan with them.

I am in the US, and thanks for all your help. (Please be nice, this is my first ever post on anything Metafilter!)

posted by TheArpenter to law & government (4 comments total)

Unknown. The rebate is a different beast than a refund. The best plan of action is to act as if they will seize it and be pleasantly surprised if the don't.
posted by pmbuko at 5:21 PM on April 29, 2008 [1 favorite has favorites]

This site has an answer in the comments.

My wife and I recently were informed that our tax refund check was being offset and applied to an old school debt of hers. How will this affect our stimulus check. I will be filing an injured spouse claim soon.

Based on the information you’ve provided, I presume your wife’s old student loans are currently in default. As a result, there is a student loan lien being placed on any IRS income tax refund coming to you. Your economic stimulus tax rebate check will likely be intercepted as well. Unless the student loan debt is paid off or missed payments are made current, your rebate check money will likely be siphoned off to pay for the outstanding loan.

You say you've started a payment plan, but have you made your missed payments current? If not, according to this guy, your rebate check will go towards the missed payments.

Of course, it's anyone's guess if he knows what he's talking about. There seems to be a lot of confusion online over these rebate checks.
posted by sbutler at 6:05 PM on April 29, 2008

Thanks. I am going to do what Pmbuko says, and then hope for the best, since Sallie Mae cannot tell me one way or the other what is even going on with my account.
posted by TheArpenter at 5:45 AM on April 30, 2008

For those of you wondering, the answer was yes.
posted by TheArpenter at 2:10 PM on August 17, 2008