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An Expensive Education

When Robert Theis attended the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, he took out a $3,000 student loan. When he went to check his account recently, the balance had increased significantly. Theis said he called UWM and they told him he’d missed a payment five years ago, but that shouldn’t account for the balance he saw: nearly $4 million. “Did I buy a building?” Theis asked. “Who goes to school for that kind of money?” UWM reached out to their third-party collection agency, Heartland ECSI. “Heartland gave us the assurance that it was a one-time glitch in the system,” said UWM Director of Financial Aid Tim Opgenorth. Theis did figure out where the dollar figure came from. “The amount, in fact, wasn’t the amount owed,” he said. “It was my Social Security number.” While Heartland said it “does not discuss individual borrower accounts with the media,” it assured reporters that its systems were not hacked. Theis, however, said he’ll be monitoring his credit reports. “I guess I won’t wait for a creditor to tell me, ‘Hey, there’s a problem’,” he said. (MS/WITI Milwaukee) ...Looks like his education is paying off.