Student Loans and Late Payments

[Anonymous]

Hello,
I have most of my student loans through the services nelnet. Although I pay one monthly payment, the loans are listed individually on my credit report. At the beginning of last year I missed a few payments and but I paid what I could. Prior to the beginning of last year there were no lates and I had a perfect payment history for 3yrs. I had some medical things pop up and I prioritized that over trying to pay for loans. I want to try and dispute them (maybe a GW letter) but I’m also interested to know if I consolidated the loans would it remove some of the late marks off my report. Literally my only late payments are from these loans!!! I’m curious because they are listed separately so instead of having a totall of 5 missed payments I have 20!! Any insight would help. The only things on my credit are SL, car, and my CC.

[calyx]

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@Anonymous wrote:
Hello,
I have most of my student loans through the services nelnet. Although I pay one monthly payment, the loans are listed individually on my credit report. At the beginning of last year I missed a few payments and but I paid what I could. Prior to the beginning of last year there were no lates and I had a perfect payment history for 3yrs. I had some medical things pop up and I prioritized that over trying to pay for loans. I want to try and dispute them (maybe a GW letter) but I’m also interested to know if I consolidated the loans would it remove some of the late marks off my report. Literally my only late payments are from these loans!!! I’m curious because they are listed separately so instead of having a totall of 5 missed payments I have 20!! Any insight would help. The only things on my credit are SL, car, and my CC.

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I have the same issue - multiple lates because 1 payment = many loans.
Consolidation does not remove the lates.

Do *not* dispute them as they are  correct, just send goodwill letters.  Nelnet will just confirm that the lates are correct if you dispute.

[Anonymous]

Rebuilding101:
You cannot dispute then as you are aware that they are correct. Goodwill letters are also ineffective because federal student loans are different. They are required by law to report accurately.
Consolidation will but do anything with the lates. What it will do is create a new tradeline that is at 100% utilization. If you were working towards an Income-driven repayment plan with forgiveness it will reset all the payments you've made so far. The only upside to consolidation imo is if you intend to pay off the entire loans for sure and you could benefit from the averaging of the APRs/ fixed rate if you have a variable rate now.
What kind of lates were they? If only 30 or even 60, the effect on your credit score will lessen over time. It sucks to see one mistake multiplied but it won't hold you back as much as you think it might.
Lastly, if you ever end up in that situation again, you can always do a temporary deferment. This would halt your payments so you could focus on other expenses like medical.
Another option is just to stick with an income-driven repayment plan if the shortage will be not really a few months and it involves your income. If you use your paystub it can bring the payment down as low as $0, for a whole year.
Hope this helps.