Potential Defenses to The College Network Assignees

I've been looking at some documents lately relating to a loan by Lifeway Credit Union for a LPN-to RN contract by The College Network.  The College Network is a defunct Indiana firm that sold LPN-RN programs. TCN was accused of selling the programs as if they were a full class program while at the same time claiming htey were just a provider of educational material.  It has come to my attention that the Credit Unions that provided capital to The College Network by funding their student accounts are still trying to collect these debts even though The College Network was run out of business for being a deeptive operation.

From what I have been able to gather, Lifeway Credit Union was a relatively-small player regarding TCN contracts. Southeast Fenderal Credit Union the most contracts and We Florida Financial Credit Union was a player.  Southeast Federal Credit Union sued TCN.  See this link. 

If you have a debt to a credit union arising out of a contract with The College Network, you should be that if TCN referred you to the lender, any claim or defense you could raise against The College Network you can raise against your lender up to the amount of the contract.  This means you MIGHT have an offensive claim to get some money back.  You have an even better chance at getting out of the loan obligation and getting your credit report clear.

It seems that most of the contracts that I've seen involved either Southeast Financial Credit Union or Lifeway Credit Union.  The Attorney General of New York brought an action against Southeast Financial Credit Union for disregarding the claims and defenses of the studnets.  You can read about it here. 

Until recently, when I have received calls about The College Network, I have referred callers to fellow NACA member attorneys in their area.  Quite frankly, I have been disappointed by the results, as the lawyers I have referred the consumers to have not known what to do with the cases.  I recently noticed that The College Network contract that I reviewed included a clause mandating binding arbitration in Marion County, Indiana. Now, the general rule is that binding arbitration is a disaster for consumers, BUT depending on the Arbitration agency, binding consumer arbitration may cost the business a lot more than the consumer, and may discourage a suit against the consumer.  Marion County, Indiana happens to be my home county.  Because of the connection to Indiana and the arbitration clause, I have decided to take on cases defending against claims by assignees of the College Network.  If you are subject to collection activity relating to a College Network contract, please call me at 317-662-4529.

Attention College Network students: Is your credit union being straight with you regarding your obligations

I have written before about the problems that  The College Network has gotten into. The College Network arranged for its students to finance their contracts through various credit unions. The primary Credit Union appears to have been Southeast Financial Credit Union, but others include We Florida Financial Credit Union and City County Credit Union, Lifeway Credit Union and maybe others.

Despite repeated efforts to shut down this company by government agencies, The College Network is still doing business, still signing up new customers (victims), and still saddling these students with piles and piles of debt.  What these students are not being told is that they don't necessarily have to blindly keep paying on these long term contracts to avoid ruining their credit for years. If the contracts are illegal as the New York and Indiana attorneys general have asserted, then claims and defenses that could be raised against The College Network can also be raised against the companies financing the contract. Moreover, the illegalities can be used. Please call my office at 317-662-4529 or find a NACA attorney in your area at www.consumeradvocates.org.

The Strange Case of The College Network and Oak Rock Financial

I do not actually have any cases right now involving the College Network, but after hearing and reading news stories alleging hundreds of complaints against the Indianapolis-based company, I decided I better learn a little more about them. There are eight pages of complaints at the website lettertobarackobama.com. The Better Business Bureau, at the time I checked, reported 426 complaints about the College Network.  It appears that they may not promise the same things to all the applicants. One thing appears clear, and that is the College Network asserts that they are not a school. This means the loans people take out are not student loans given special treatment by federal law, including being exempt from discharge in bankruptcy without substantial hardship.

If you have a loan originated by the College Network with ANY finance company, you should be aware that any claim or defense that you could raise against the College Network you can raise as a defense against your lender.  In other words, you might have a defense to paying your student loans.

One finance company that has been reported to be used by the College Network, Inc. is Oak Rock Financial, LLC.  Oak Rock's CEO, John Murphy was found guilty of defrauding the bank's investors to the tune of almost $100 million.  He could have received 30 years in prison, but he actually got sentenced to 8 years one month.  Note that when a scam artist defrauds wealthy investors and venture capitalists, that scamster gets prosecutor, but when big banks defraud millions of ordinary Americans, those banksters get off scott free.

Please contact my office by phone or email if you want to talk about it. Or you can find a NACA consumer lawyer in your area at www.naca.net.  I would like to collect a list of all the finance companies used by the College Network and all the debt collection agencies used by those lenders.

Some names that have come up in the scope of my investigation  are:

American Credit Exchange
Westcom Credit Union
Southeast Financial Credit Union
Lifeway Credit Union
Lockhart Morris and Montgomery