We got the exclusive unconfirmed NSLDS update right here.

First off....the Department of Education axed access to NSLDS to everybody in the industry EXCEPT for institutions of higher education and student borrowers. We did get a tip that 15 schools lost their access during this NSLDS hiatus....don't know which schools those are.

This Tuesday, April 24, we heard that the servicer than exclusively handles the Direct Loan program got their access back. So perfect, the Direct Loan program is up and running.

But this is interesting: we hear that the Department is really focusing on the fully vertically integrated institutions. That's organizations that have an internal marketing front end, an internal financing vehicle, an internal guarantee agency, and an internal servicing function. There's not too many of these...examples include: Sallie Mae, AES/PHEAA, and Great Lakes....probably a few others, but those come to mind initially. But here's what we didn't know. The guarantee agency's get a full dump of NSLDS. The certification of the loan level guarantee requires a 360 view of the database. So, if an organization has a marketing front end in-house and a guarantee agency in-house, there's the opportunity for shennanigans theres. Not many shops are strucutred like this though.

Our snooping and nosing around also yielded that access will be fully up and running in 2-3 weeks. The Department is not notifying people when access is available.....just need to keep checking.

This is all unconfirmed rumor...this is the good stuff we eat up.