Student Loan Fund offers incentives to debtors
The Student Loan Fund has come up with schemes to encourage its 2.8 million debtors to pay up, revealing that 70 per cent or up to 2.02 million of them were "problematic".
Finance permanent secretary Areepong Bhoocha-oom, who also serves as chairperson of the Fund, said yesterday that the debtors had been divided into three groups. The first group covers 666,000 debtors with normal payment records owing a total of Bt58.4 billion. This group would enjoy a 3.5 per cent discount if they were to repay the entire debt in one go. The second group covers those who have not paid at all – they will be given a 50 per cent discount on the interest if they were to repay in one go. The third group covers defaulters who now wish to pay back in instalments. Once they inform the fund of their intentions, they will be exempted from the fine.
The second and third groups, whose debts add up to around Bt190 billion, have from November to March next year to register. The fund is also looking for ways to have serious defaulters blacklisted by the Credit Bureau, he added.
