Medical Residents – Before you finish your academic year, now is the time to complete the Employment Certification Form (ECF) if you are pursuing Public Service Loan Forgiveness (PSLF).
In order to ensure you’re on the right track for loan forgiveness, it is imperative that you submit the Employment Certification Form (ECF). You should turn in this form if you plan on having success with the PSLF program.
You should submit this form:
- As soon as you start your first public service job
- Yearly from that point on, and
- Any time you switch employers
This form is used to help verify you are on the right track and to inform you about anything you can do and adjustments you can make to maximize the amount forgiven in the future.
Since people who are interested in PSLF should be on income-driven repayment plans, I recommend submitting your annual ECF simultaneously while you recertify your income-based payments.
You can find the link to the ECF form below:
https://studentaid.gov/sites/default/files/public-service-employment-certification-form.pdf
One of the challenges to completing public service loan forgiveness is diligent record keeping and making sure that the loan servicers record the correct information. We have created an Excel workbook to assist where you can keep track of each of the 120 monthly payments, the repayment plan you are utilizing, date of employment and completion of certification form, as well as a log of any correspondence with loan servicers or the Department of Education.
If you have federal loans please download your student loan federal file for us by logging in here: https://studentaid.gov (https://studentaid.gov/) (must be done on a computer, not phone or tablet)
Hover over your name in the top right. Select "My Aid" and click "View Details" - after you click "View Details" - Select "Download My Aid Data" & continue - your .txt file should download to your computer,