Sallie Mae employees treated to Hawaii trip amid student loan crisis
Sallie Mae – Over 100 employees enjoyed a five-day, all-expense paid trip to Hawaii in August amid a burgeoning student debt crisis.
According to an NBC Nightly News report, executives and members of the sales team were treated by their bosses to a stay at the Fairmont resort on Maui’s Wailea Beach in celebration of a record year of $5 billion in college loans lent to 374,000 borrowers.
While the lending firm did not pay for its employees’ families to join, the report revealed some family members joined, regardless.
“We said, ‘Hey, look, Maui is a pretty nice spot,’” Sallie Mae CEO Ray Quinlan told NBC while at the Fairmont Hotel. “And so if you wanted to stay a few days or want to bring family, that’s up to you.”
“We’ve had good years, we’ve had bad years,” Quinlan added. “This is a sales get-together for all of our salespeople,” he continued while claiming that Sallie Mae employees have been taking such trips since the company was established back in the 1970s.
Meanwhile, as Sallie Mae employees soaked up the Hawaiian sun, borrower Paige McDaniel told NBC that she eventually was forced to declare bankruptcy due to her inability to pay $1,500 per month for a $120,000 student loan she had taken out years ago to pay for a graduate school program.
“When I told them that, you know, I couldn’t afford that, could we make some payment arrangements, they essentially said, ‘So sorry, we’ll put a lien on your house and garnish your wages if you don’t make those payments,’” McDaniel said, adding that she had hired an attorney to sue Navient, a U.S. corporation who facilitate and collect student loan debts.
Source – https://www.foxbusiness.com/money/
Read Also – Defamation of Character by Unfair Victimization