Financial Aid People Suck

[movingonup]

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Honestly, I have not talked to a nice, helpful person in a financial aid office in a med school.
They are alway abrupt, and never answer the questions fully... nor do they ever answer all the questions for that matter.

What the hell is wrong with this. I thought we were supposed be able to talke to them and work out our aid and they would be flexible and stuff... I have got none of this.

What do they expect us to know!!! It's not like I take out $50,000 every freaking day. I have questions and they need answering and when only the financial aid advisor can answer it (because it pertains directly to the award from that school) then they should answer the damned question right?

Doesn't that make sense.

Are they angry because they never have any money to give? The admissions people have been great... its just these financial aid people. Is this universal?!?

 

[ad_sharp]

Here's the deal.....Financial aid people are just like admissions people--they know that you depend on them to get you something that you really need (You need them much more than they need you). It seem like they are very impatient and devoid of useful information. I don't know if it happens before or after you work in a financial aid office, but any form of something that may have resembled a desire for "customer service" just went out the window. At your school, financial aid people don't have to compete for your business. There is one office. There is one staff, and they're all you've got.

 

[jlee9531]

yeah that does suck. maybe you need to talk to someone higher up?

 

[evescadeceus]

Completely agree with this. I've been on financial aid for undergrad, and will be on it for med school. Financial aid during my undergrad resembled a giant welfare office, and aid at the various med schools I interviewed with were rude time-wasters whose job I could perform myself. Once you consolidate your loans with a lender, you will get decent service when you have to call them with questions. Only when you have to start paying them do you get anything resembling service with a smile. I dread the thought of four more years of this crap in order to get through med school.

 

[snapdad]

Huh...that sucks. I've been talking with the financial aid folks at Drexel lately and they seem pretty cool. MUCH cooler than the people in my undergrad's financial aid office, who seemed to think they were doing me a huge favor even talking to me.

 

[DrMom]

Wow. You guys are making me appreciate my school's financial aid more than I already do. Our office is absolutely wonderful. Maybe you should all transfer to OSU. 😉


Honestly, ours is great. I'm sorry you guys are having to deal with such unhelpful people.

 

[Heal&Teach]

movingonup,

I feel you. I haven't received the rudeness so much as I've experienced the feeling of never having my questions answered. I wish that I could just sit down with these people face to face... it seems like that might be the only way to have a civil and productive conversation sometimes.

H&T (aka Equally Frustrated)

 

[E.A. Poe]

Are you all talking about East Coast schools? Those are the only ones where I've experienced this.

A plug: MCW is the picture of proper midwestern cordiality. Everyone I talked to at every single level there was extremely nice and helpful.

 

[Trekkie963]

Fortunately I haven't had that kind of bad experience, neither at undergrad or dealing with med schools.

The people at USC seem nice and friendly, but they are annoyingly slow processing my aid application, and I am not very optimistic about what the outcome may be.

😳

 

[movingonup]

for me this has definately been an east coast school thing. I don't know much about other schools because I didn't do much applying or visiting to the midwest or west coast.

 

[BassDominator]

Our financial aid guy is all business.... you can't even get a smile out of him. I once noticed he had a nasty cold and a bottle of cough medicine on his desk.... he didn't even acknowledge my "hope you feel better." You should see how his desk is arranged.... so anal retentive. Pencils in rows.... not a think out of place. I think he would have an MI if I touched anything.

 

[BaseballFan]

I have had a great experience with FA at Cornell.

They answer all of my questions and have been very helpful.

 

[Teufelhunden]

Completely agree with this. I've been on financial aid for undergrad, and will be on it for med school. Financial aid during my undergrad resembled a giant welfare office, and aid at the various med schools I interviewed with were rude time-wasters whose job I could perform myself. Once you consolidate your loans with a lender, you will get decent service when you have to call them with questions. Only when you have to start paying them do you get anything resembling service with a smile. I dread the thought of four more years of this crap in order to get through med school.

Don't worry, evescadeceus. OUCOM's financial aid office is wonderful...very friendly. I've never had a problem with them. In fact, you won't encounter any rudeness anywhere in the Student Affairs Department.

 

[velo]

Yeah maybe the OPs problem is an east coast thing....my fin aid office here in the midwest was helpful and very patient.

 

[Stroganoff]

OK, I'll open up a little here, if only because you guys are so damn cool and we're in this together:

CWRU (Ohio) Undergrad FinAid is a bureacracy. I unsuccessfully battled them since March 25, 2002 regarding a simple issue of parental custody (I lived with my mom until senior year of high school, then moved to my dad's, but I had to put my mom down as custodial parent for freshman year of college, then my dad from then on). They screwed me out of ~$10,000, and after numerous calls and visits to their office, nothing. My parents and stepdad have individually written letters. They don't even acknowledge receiving letters or e-mail. The director acts like an dingus. We wrote the president of the university, but no action was taken.

Because of nonpayment, I had lots of interest charges to my outstanding balance (which should have rightfully been covered by grants that I did not receive), collection agencies calling me, etc. I was stressed out, my health declined, and my GPA and happiness took a MAJOR hit. I got so sick of helplessly fighting it I returned to my hometown last Fall 2003 for a semester here (Missouri) and noticed how incredibly nice and helpful the people were here. Ironic how Case only has 3700 undergrads yet they're rude and uncaring. Here there are 11,000 undergrads yet they'll bend over backwards for you!!!

I once politely called to ask if they (Case) had received a fax. "Call again later! We don't check our fax machines every 5 minutes!!!" was the response. They also tend to "accidentally" hang up the phone on you. "Hold on, I'll put you on hold. *click* "

I actually very seriously thought about writing a packet with all my financial aid forms, documentation, tax forms, etc. and getting it printed and bound at Kinko's and send it out to all the directors, provosts, and president, and even seriously considered WALKING the 800 miles to Cleveland during my summer break and collapsing in front of the university president's house just to be heard.

I felt so desperate yet I knew that all this was severely affecting my GPA (it's not even 2.5 now) and my health, so I decided to forgive them and move on with my life. $10,000 is a disgusting amount of money to be ****ed over, especially from your own school, but in the grand scheme of life, I'm stronger than all this. I'll overcome. God will show me a way. (If you're not religious, at least tolerate mine).

Anyway, I wish you the best of luck with dealing with your med school's FinAid offices. Just make sure you have everything in writing and organize all your paperwork in a nice file folder for your own good. 🙂

 

[Dr Turninkoff]

I have had a great experience with FA at Cornell.

They answer all of my questions and have been very helpful.

that's because they have major buckos to give you. i'm praying for a cornell admit.