ASA Direct^®—Lender Enhancements

Based on valuable feedback we received from our lender clients, ASA will be implementing some enhancements for lender clients effective Monday, April 16.

• – Lender Manifest files will be automatically retrieved and decrypted, eliminating numerous manual steps. The streamlining of this process will eliminate the possibility of errors and processing delays
• – The Lender Invoice Summary Report will now be available to lender and servicer clients on a daily basis on ASA Direct. To ensure that clients receive the information as quickly and as securely as possible, the reports will no longer be e-mailed effective Friday, April 27, 2007. Current recipients of the Lender Invoice Summary Report will be automatically receive an e-mail message notifying them that the report is available for download.
  
  Please note that clients who are subscribed to more than one report may receive multiple notification e-mail messages.
• – 3 custom reports will now enable lender and servicer clients to include or exclude consolidation loan volume: Guarantee Monthly Summary Report, Loan Processing Detail (Without Borrower Detail), and Loan Processing Detail (With Borrower Detail), Loan Interest Rate and In School Rate columns have been added to both Loan Processing Detail reports in order to provide lender and servicer clients with more useful information. Loan Status and Incomplete/Reject Reasons has also been added to the Loan Processing Detail (With Borrower Detail) report.
• – System upgrades will be implemented in order to greatly reduce the time it takes to run the CommonLine4 M Record Suppression Report. Lender and servicer clients should notice a significant improvement when running this report.

The following enhancements being implemented for school clients may also be of interest to you:

• – The SCR Page will now display the entire lender code, including any lender branch codes
• – School clients will be able to print certification confirmations after certifying individual loans on ASA Direct. Each printable confirmation will contain basic loan information.
• – Loan limits will increase on undergraduate and graduate Stafford Loans with a first disbursement on or after July 1, 2008. School clients will now be able to certify these increased loan amounts. Note that before certifying a Grad PLUS loan, you must determine the borrower’s Stafford loan eligibility and notify the borrower of the maximum Stafford loan amount he or she is eligible to receive. You must also provide a comparison of terms between Stafford and Grad PLUS regarding interest rates, when interest accrues, and when loans enter repayment. The increased loan limits are summarized below for dependent undergraduate students:
  
  

  Student	Subsidized/unsubsidized base amount	Additional unsubsidized amount for loans first disbursed prior to July 1, 2008	Additional unsubsidized amount for loans first disbursed on or after July 1, 2008
  First year	$3,500	$0	$2,000
  Second year	$4,500	$0	$2,000
  Third year and after	$5,500	$0	$2,000

  
  The Stafford aggregate loan limit increased from $23,000 to $31,000 for dependent undergraduate students, as well. However, please note that only $23,000 may be subsidized.
  
  The loan limits have also been increased for independent undergraduate students or dependent undergraduates whose parents have been denied a PLUS loan as summarized below:
  
  

  Student	Subsidized/unsubsidized base amount	Additional unsubsidized amount for loans first disbursed prior to July 1, 2008	Additional unsubsidized amount for loans first disbursed on or after July 1, 2008
  First year	$3,500	$4,000	$6,000
  Second year	$4,500	$4,000	$6,000
  Third year and after	$5,500	$5,000	$7,000

  
  The Stafford aggregate loan limit also increased from $46,000 to $57,500 for independent, undergraduate students. However, please note that only $23,000 may be subsidized.
  
  The annual and aggregate loan limit for graduate and professional students has not changed: it is still $20,500, of which up to $8,500 may be subsidized Stafford. In addition, origination fees on loans first disbursed on or after July 1, 2008, will be reduced to an Origination fee of 1%..
• – Borrowers who e-Sign their Graduate PLUS on ASA Direct will be authenticated through the Student Authentication Network (STAN), similar to ASA’s current Stafford e-Sign process.
• – School clients will now be able to view the distribution of their loan volume across lenders through a new custom report. The Loan Volume by Lender Report will list all approved, canceled, and disbursed loans for each lender code and any related branches.

We rely on your feedback in order to further improve our products and services. If you have any suggestions or questions about these enhancements, please contact your client manager or ASA’s Call Center at 800.999.9080 and select Option 1. The Call Center’s hours of operation are Monday through Friday from 8:30 a.m. to 9:00 p.m. ET.