By The CFPB received about 22,900 complaints about private and federal student loans between July 1, 2024, and June 30, 2025, the highest level the Bureau has received in a one-year period, the CFPB’s Private Education Loan Ombudsman said in its annual report.
The CFPB received about 2,100 debt collection complaints related to private and federal student loan debt, according to the report.
However, the Bureau was careful to state in the report that it only verifies that the complainant has a relationship with the company that is the subject of the complaint; it does not verify the accuracy of the allegations in a complaint. Significantly, in charts included with the report, it noted that companies concluded that only 3.1% of private student loan complaints and only 0.8% of federal student loan complaints warranted monetary or non-monetary relief.
The Bureau also reported that:
- The CFPB received about 4,500 private student loan complaints – an increase of about 33%. That represents the fifth highest number of private student loan complaints the CFPB received in a one-year period.
- The Bureau received about 18,400 federal student loan complaints – an increase of about 36% compared to the previous year. That is the highest number of federal student loan complaints the CFPB has received in a one-year period, the agency said.
- Entities failed to respond in a timely manner to about 20% of private student loan complaints. That is double the untimely rate between 2023 and 2024.
- Companies closed about 78% of complaints sent to them with an explanation or with relief, and consumers provided feedback about the company’s response by completing an optional survey in approximately 22% of these complaints. Approximately 91% of consumers who provided feedback reported that they did not think the response addressed all their concerns.
- “Further, frauds and scams have been active in the student loan market. This may be attributable to, in part, a lack of timeliness and responsiveness from companies. In the absence of timely and responsive answers, consumers may seek answers elsewhere to resolve their issues creating an environment for fraudsters and scammers to prey upon consumers.”
The CFPB said that policymakers, federal and state law enforcement agencies, advocacy groups and/or market participants may wish to consider:
- Initiating coordinated and collaborative consumer education efforts regarding frauds and scams, evaluating the effectiveness of those efforts with measurable metrics, and reinforcing the successes with additional resources.
- Coordinating the enforcement actions and/or prosecution of individuals and/or prosecution of organizations and individuals perpetrating fraud and scams and widely distribute the results.
- Addressing the lack of timeliness and responsiveness in company complaint responses
The report does not include any recommendations from the Private Education Loan Ombudsman. It does state in a footnote that Geof Gradler was designated as the Private Education Loan Ombudsman on January 6, 2026, and he worked with a prior Student Loan Ombudsman, Robert Cameron, to draft the report. According to Politico, the original draft prepared by Gradler’s predecessor, Julia Barnard, was substantially revised.
