Hard methods in Sweden
The Swedish State Educational Loan Fund uses detectives, court systems and Facebook to track down lethargic payers, and their uncollected debt is half of what it is in Norway.
The total breach of study debt to the State Educational Loan Fund is on around fire billion kroner, according to the Sundy edition of Aftenposten. In Sweden, the unpaid debt is on around two billion Swedish kroner.
– This has been a big problem for us, too. It is a slow process, and it is hard to give any specific numbers on how much we have collected of the total debt, says Klas Elfving in Centrala Studiestödsnämden (CSN), the Swedish equivalent of the Norwegian State Educational Loan Fund.
A fairly big part of the reason for the uncollected debt is that many student fail to state an address when they move or go abroad. People living abroad are especially difficult to track down.
Detectives on the case
Therefore, CSN has begun a close cooperation with the debt-collector agency Intrum Justitia. They have placed so-called «detectives» in countries like France, Greece, and Australia. When they get an idea concerning the whereabouts of a debtor, the detectives contact local post offices, churches, and talk to the neighbors.
– Now we receive money all the time, also from students abroad. Out of the 20 000 missing addresses, we have now found 4000. So things are starting to move, says Elfving.
To the courtroom
CSN also does name-searches on Facebook and other social mediums, and today 60 employees work on debt collection exclusively. Fifty of those sixty people work with domestic cases, and ten of them work on international cases. In specific cases they also involve the court system in the debtor’s native country.
– These are difficult, tough and groundbreaking measures. Not many authorities collect debt abroad. But we can’t sit and look at the missing money. That would affect the future taxpayers.
Less pressure in Norway
In Norway the case is left to Norwegian National Collection Agency (NCA) if the State Educational Loan Fund fails to get in touch with a person who is holding back study debt. They cooperate with the debt-collection agency ABD Kredittstyring, who also works with «detectives». However, they use neither social mediums nor court systems abroad. The amount of employees working on debt collection is also way below 60.
– We have nine executive officers who work on domestic study loans as volunteers, and eight of them abroad. These officers also work with other forms of collection, however, confirms Turid Meidell of the Norwegian National Collection Agency.
Liv Rønnaug Bjerke Lilleåsen DOT Translated by Ingrid F. Brubaker
