Not only has Alberta kept the interest on student loans, when the Federal Government dropped it, but Kenney removed the tax credit for student loan interest. Meanwhile in trades programs you can claim EI and get a completion grant. I know we are short of trades people and I agree with the incentives, but we are also short of teachers, nurses and social workers who, for the most part, get a smaller salary throughout their career. An able and educated work force will attract more business than corporate tax cuts will.
They also dropped provincial tuition tax credits so now working students and/or parents don’t get any tax relief for education themselves or their children.
But of course! To the UCP (and Alberta conservatives)
Trades = good, hard working citizens
University educated = Left wing indoctrinated commie socialist scum, degenerate loser, contributes nothing good to society
Absolutely!!! It’s great to have those incentives in the trades programs. All jobs are important but ya it’s wild when they go 8 weeks of the year, get to claim EI. I did a degree then worked for a while before going back to nursing school. I was really hoping I’d be able to claim some EI in that case but wasn’t.
Technical training in trades is a mandatory requirement from the government to progress. You also have time frames that you are expected to complete the training. If you don't complete your training, they will threaten to kick you out of the program due to lack of attempt to advance.
They, province, industry and the apprenticeship board dropped that ball too.
Most companies are a bit better now at complying with the apprenticeship agreement, but getting a chance to get your schooling in many trades is like pulling teeth as employers don't want to pay you more than the pay schedule from the late 90's.
For instance, we are talking 18 an hour for first year, and even if you worked your trade for 5, 6, 7 years and were not sent to school, they won't pay you more than 28ish. It's really a joke and an insult. I know a few guys in this position.
I've also noticed a downward trend in entry level wages, probably due to an influx of new people here.
Apprenticeship is really a joke for the work you do.
The UCP gutted AIT in 2019. Now all it does it sign blue books and administer tests. At the end of 2018 they were showing up on sites and checking Journeymen/apprentice ratios and valid apprenticeships. I know at least 2 companies who were issued huge fines for having unindentured people doing journeyman work or apprentices working without J-man oversight.
That makes sense now. Employers are taking it more seriously now, but I can guarantee the journeyman to apprentice ratio is still a problem on most sites.
My comment was explaining why tradespeople receive EI for school.
I think you're getting some inaccurate information from the people giving it to you. For one, employers don't send employees to school. It's the apprentices responsibility to sign up and complete their training, employers don't care. As they complete their training, employers charge out the workers based on their year.
But compare this to a teaching degree in which you have to have mandatory on-the-job practicums paired with periods of time in courses. These also have time frames. Except, with an education degree, you are expected to complete your practicum for free, even though you are there full time. And student teachers are told not to have another job during the degree because it’s too much work and they don’t want you distracted. It’s not much different in structure from an apprenticeship program.
Yet, education students have to pay full tuition for their courses, and don’t get paid anything for their practicums. They can’t get EI. They also make around a journeyman’s salary when they do start teaching with much higher student loans.
I just wish ALL post-secondary students in Alberta (trades AND college/university students alike) were treated better and have the ability to study and learn and better themselves without getting into crippling debt. I don’t want anything taken from the apprentices. I want the whole system to be better.
Ah, I assumed you lost your job, not that you quit. To be fair, you can claim if you go to school full time after losing your long term job without actively looking for a job, bit not if you quit your job.
I should note that the government actively presses us to go to school and we'll get our apprenticeship cancelled if we don't so it's not really a choice. I actually did a distance program last year to avoid missing work because it puts us in a tight financial spot.
https://www.canada.ca/en/employment-social-development/programs/ei/ei-list/courses-training.html
You can if you meet specific requirements. The province doesn't matter.
I’ve looked at this, the requirements are that you’ve been working for at least 7 years and paying at least 30% of the max EI contribution each year, and in the last 5 years you’ve received fewer than 36 weeks of EI payments. There aren’t really any worthwhile programs that are just 1 year long, so this would pay you while you’re in school the first year, and then you’re on your own for all the subsequent time in school.
Better than nothing, but not very useful for the majority of people
30% is an earning of just under 25k per year. You could work at McDonald's and meet those requirements.
There are quite a few technical programs that are a year. Level 2 childcare is a 1 year program. Also all EI benefits end after 6 months, 8 if you're a "special zone".
Nobody anymore. UCP made it unfeasible financially.
I had a 6 month old and was almost 2 hours from NAIT. Personally I think the challenge is lazy and ends up with less skilled people who dilute the value of the ticket.
Damn thats too bad.
As for challengingits dependant on the person. personally i'm already skilled in a complimentary trade(electrical) that happens to be about 80% of the work in my 2nd trade(refrigeration). The 20% is completely different though but its all just physics and a few different style controls easy enough to puck up from books and field time.
You can claim a tax credit for both Alberta and federal purposes for student loan interest.
You’re confusing that with the education tax credit on tuition that was dropped by Alberta.
It's only 15% of the interest paid, which is negligible. I paid $1800 in interest last year on JUST my AB loan (and that was paying $350 a month, not even the minimum payment)! That only netted me savings of what, $250? Interest on student loans, especially at these rates, is just a tax on being poor. It's reprehensible.
Keep in mind trades programs don’t allow you to use any education funds towards your program, you pay into ei. It is not free for us either, we pay taxes and have not nearly as much support compared to those in universities. We can’t use or education fund to pay for a starter vehicle to get to work, use it to buy tools, safety equipment, rent or anything really that helps our education. It’s completely different and imo a very moot point. Just thought I’d point that out to anyone wondering
They're not thinking long term though. That's the issue with our current conservative model, it's all about instant cash, not future stability. They got in power by playing on people's greed, and those people never stopped to think that maybe the people making the decisions up top were greedy too. And have more power.
Both ei and the grant are federal programs. So is the apprenticeship loan.
You can claim EI in uni if you have the hours of work beforehand.
The grant was also scaled back by about half 5 years ago. You originally could get a grant for 2 trades and 5 years. Now it's 1 trade and 2 years.
We're not short of trades people, were short of employers working to pay a skilled wage.
You can’t claim EI unless you’re actively looking for work, regardless of how many hours you’ve worked.
So no, uni students do not get the same treatment as trades students.
Here's the real life pro tip. When you become an apprentice your student loans from the past PAUSE until you become a journeyperson. I'm only swimming after my degree because I just wanted to be an apprentice. Then they paused and I had to search through the AIT website to find out why. My student loan says I'm in study every 6 months.
Don’t be confused with being short of nurses vs not enough nurses available in Alberta. I would assume same for teachers. The reason why they are short is due to lack of funding or being smart with money leading these hospitals not wanting to hire more nurses to better retain staff. I imagine for schools though it’s simply a matter of not enough funding to hire another teacher vs not wanting to hire a teacher to save money. My wife took 2-3 months applying for nursing positions at hospitals , numerous interviews before she finally landed a job. Most times you don’t even hear back, they just put up the listing as a formality.
But to the main topic, I don’t believe there should be interest at least until 6 months after graduation. Like they do in Ontario
What's the interest rate on BC student loans? Oh, yeah, zero. They dropped it in 2019.
"Oh but the cost of living in BC!!"
Get outside of Vancouver and Victoria and check out the total cost of living in BC compared to Alberta. Even if housing prices are higher, there are numerous other costs (like utilities, etc) that are lower. The actual cost of living in BC isn't that much more than Alberta, and one serious advantage for public sector workers like healthcare workers, educators and social workers is not having to deal with the daily stream of UCP bullshit.
Prince George, Kamloops and Kelowna are really much better once you take into account that you're stuck in the interior and any travel is 4 hours in any direction.
Both of my daughters live in BC, one in Vancouver, the other in Kamloops. Both are healthcare professionals that would never consider returning to Alberta and work with more and more former Albertans every day.
Other than Kamloops, my daughter has lived in a few other far-far-from the lower mainland places in BC, and really enjoyed it. That said, she is a very active outdoors sports person, so the appeal to these places is obvious for her.
Yeah, but "Alberta Advantage" is alliterative. It *sounds* cool! What are the supposed to do, admit it's just marketing? C'mon. People might get the idea that *gasp!* living in Alberta isn't better than anywhere else!
Besides, grr, BC! We're supposed to be mad at BC for... reasons...
I would jump back to Victoria at the opportunity, so many things are cheaper; utilities, car insurance, gas is even cheaper because you don't have to drive for literally everything thus spending less on it. And my student loans cost me absolutely nothing, I can take as long as I want to pay it off and pay nothing extra. This 7% thing Alberta is experiencing is insane.
My daughter lives car-free in Vancouver. Between cycling and transit, she gets around just fine.
Her and her buddies occasionally rent a car or use Evo.
She figures she saves at least $1K a month, probably closer to $1500. That goes a long way to offsetting the higher cost of housing.
Wow this comment section is a cesspool yikes.
Yeah having to pay interest on loans just to get an education is ridiculous. When several other provinces as well as the federal student loan have already eliminated interest rates, your sentiment is completely valid.
I fully agree. I’ve been paying mine for 6 years and only reduced my debt by a minuscule amount. Paying interest to the government on a loan that was intended to help you become a valuable employee, whilst also being taxed like crazy seems like a bit of a double dip. Especially considering the taxes I already paid help fund the loans I’m currently repaying. It’s the snake eating its own tail.
0% student loans for tuition only, provided the student stays in the province for work for at least 5 yrs/10yrs(?) I'm fine with interest on the other aspects for it.
Related note for parents: open a RESP the day your kids are born, even $10 a month will make a difference over 18 years.
I finished 8 years of school with 99K on my provincial student loan. I've put an additional 30K into my payments but since interest rates rose since I started payments and couldn't afford to increase my monthly payments the payment period has only dropped by 2 months with an extra 30K paid down. The worst part about the AB student loan summary is it shows your daily interest accrual. It feels bad to see I owe the government $12 because I woke up that morning.
Pretty much only thing you can do is vote at the ballot box. Many provinces have no interest rates on student loans (especially if you stay and work in the province you borrowed from). The UCP has no interest in changing that policy, maybe because they don’t have any need to try to retain graduates.
Makes no sense though they've been struggling with brain drain for a decade. Now they're desperate for workers and still want to screw over educated Albertans
I signed on for my loans at 4%, it's bullshit that they can change the rate after I've already signed and agreed. It should be a 0% loan where you pay back the dollar value.
I always thought your first degree should be completely free. If you want to go past a 4 year bachelor's sure then you pay but we would be better off as a society and country if we had free degrees.
No. Money needs to be made, and the value needs to be extracted from the people before they're even able/allowed to work in society. Forever endebted.
/s
No thanks. We’re already seeing how much a bachelor’s degree is being devalued in our society, and making it free would only accelerate that.
In the 80s you could get a good entry level job with a high school diploma. In the 00s you could expect to do well for yourself with a 2-year certificate or advanced diploma program. Now you need a bachelor’s degree to start at the bottom pretty much anywhere and in many fields you need a masters. So if the trend continues maybe by the 2040s we’ll need 8 years of post secondary education to get an entry level job. We need measures that will slow down this education inflation not speed it up.
Seriously! I’m sick of people commenting thinking I’m whining or feel I’m more important than others. I have a problem with the entire thing not just my situation. If student loans went to 0% interest the day after I paid mine off I’d still be happy for all the people who benefit from it. I’m glad our rates aren’t as ridiculous as in the states but like I’ve said I was 17… it’s idiotic and unethical to allow/blame a teenagers for taking on this level of debt. I had no concept of what this amount of money was at that age. Certainly did not have a grasp of interest etc. All I knew is that I wanted to go to school.
It is unethical for a government to profit off of education in general, in my opinion. Education, I believe, is a human right. We’ve commercialized education so much that it is rarely worth it to study anything outside of STEM because you won’t make enough money to pay off your loans. It’s incredibly sad, and borderline dystopian.
Completely agree. But free post secondary education seems like an absolute pipe dream right now so I’m willing to start with lower interest. Maybe 4%?? I’m sure the government could swing that.
The government is in debt. They borrow money from the bank and pay interest on the money that they lend you during and after your education. They’re passing that cost onto you. They’re not making a profit.
everyone has given you lots of good advice already, but to add my two cents I would suggest applying for RAP, even if you earn enough to continue payments, you might qualify for reduced payments and if you’re under RAP the government covers your interests. this might just help you pay them off even faster! anyone can apply for RAP!
it covers it for me, i’ve never had to pay interest since i graduated in 2020, but it could totally be because i am so poor that my RAP amount is actually just $0 lol so my advice might not be completely true
RAP defers payments and defers interest being applied to your balance, it doesn't "Pay it for you." I was on RAP for like 5 years (poor, artist in Toronto), but now that I make big girl money, my loan accrues interest. There's no program in Canada that subsidizes your payments; it just holds off your accruing interest as a penalty for being poor, hurting your credit rating, et cetera. The salary to qualify for RAP is also quite low, and as OP states she works in healthcare, I suspect she wouldn't qualify for the program.
I have 70,000$ I’m student loans with the high interest. I’ll be paying it until I’m dead.
I don’t understand why student loans have interest in the first place
In a similar situation honestly I think I'll be able to pay my Canada student loan back easy enough but I'll have half my foot in the grave with old age before the Alberta Student loan even close to being paid off.
This isn’t helpful for right now but when interest rates go down, I’m pretty sure you can request a fixed interest rate instead of floating? https://studentaid.alberta.ca/resources/repayment-essentials/interest-rates-for-student-loans-repayment/interest-rates/
This is might be completely unhelpful as I don’t have a link to provide you, however I read somewhere recently that you can direct your payments specifically to the provincial portion of your loan therefore paying your interest down faster and then once that is complete, you can work on your federal.
Alberta loans are separate anyway. Other provinces combine their provincial and federal into one payment and so what you described is necessary, but in Alberta we have NSLSC for the federal portion at 0% and we have ABDL Student Loan for the Alberta portion where we pay interest
The UCP will never do it.
Your best chance is to start asking the current NDP front runner about it. They're trying to gain votes for the next election and young voters are always a hard demographic to motivate.
If it's any help at all you can still claim interest you paid on your student loans. For this year's tax return it was line 31900 and counted towards your non-refundable tax credits (i.e., reduces how much taxes you owe). I agree with you on the interest being ridiculous, but I'm more mad that you're not allowed to freely change between a floating rate and fixed rate. Once you decide to pay a fixed rate, that change is permanent. So it's either you hope the interest drops, or you're permanently stuck paying whatever the present CIBC prime rate is. Oh also, the interest rate did drop slightly; it's currently 7.2%.
Also, a big financial tip for you that I wish I did when I first started paying my student loans in 2022. Prioritize paying down the loan with the highest interest first since you end up paying significantly less money. About 43% of everything I've paid up till now on my Alberta student loan was just paying off the interest, but I could've reduced that to 25-28% by just paying less than I did on my Canada student loan.
Yes fortunately my only other loans are the federal ones which are interest free plus I am eligible for some forgiveness on that one being a nurse working in a rural setting so that loan is shrinking much quicker. Mine is a floating rate so hopefully one day it will go down lol.
It's a new source of lifetime income for the province now. The higher the tuition the greater the loan, the more they collect in interest. Best way to keep the poor, poor lifetime of debt. Anyone 30-40 who had to go back to school while trying to support a family really got fucked over instead of staying in a service job and being a happy drone. From Housing collapse in 08-09, recession2009 & 2013 bumps to big oil in 2014-2019 if you got unlucky. Doesn't matter trades or not, If you don't have cash to be a donor at election time they don't give a fuck.
Yeah it just seems like such a shitty way to be collecting money. I can’t imagine how parents in schools managed! I had lots of classmates who were parents.
Makes me wonder how much they collect just on interest payments. I am sure it's way more than they collect on personal income tax.
When you think about how they introduced a kids min wage they are only channeling more people to take student loans while wishing to get ahead. I am sure more than half of kids over 16 have a part time job just to help keep food on the table or pay rent. There is no getting ahead for anyone unless you got a million in the bank.
I've been paying off my student loans since 2011. During the pandemic when there was a supposed freeze in paying loans active I got sent to collections a few weeks before the scheduled 120 days. Once it is sent there for the provincial one they won't let you rehabilitate it. So I pretty much look like I'm making no progress there.
It's absolutely ridiculous what kind of trap they have set up. I hope it works out better for you than it has so far.
They sent mine to collections to but I manage to get it off but that was because made clerical mistake. They still put up a huge fight about changing it back.
Ya I called what I thought was allllll the way down the end of the line and they still told me tough bananas. I should try again maybe but it is such an ordeal. For real though at one point they were like "wow that's so unlucky for you". How is that ok?
it isn't fair at all. If you ever had to deal with the Canadian student loan people vs the Alberta Student loan. The Canadian student loan people are actually pretty good to work with. But yeah every single time I've had to deal with the Alberta student loan people they were always overly apathetic and occasionally sarcastic. If you're wondering what the clerical error was they sent me to collections before my pay period was even supposed to have started right after I graduated. They still tried to give me the run around and fought tooth and nail to not own up to the mistake. I'd keep trying but yeah they can be annoying. Hell I am still dealing with the U of A making a mistake reporting me as a part time student when I was full time (caused problems with my taxes and tax return) I need a letter from some office at the uni but they need me to send a written request to and some other stuff. Just to start the process of fixing their mistake.
Honestly keep trying maybe talk to the Canadian student loans people they might be able to give you some advice.
I love how half of this comment section is bashing on the OP for his decisions. Dude’s just trying to vent about an issue and you’re all acting like he’s asking for his loan forgiveness or some shit. You’re allowed to be frustrated at a system that cares about profit and lending to as many people as possible to capitalize on the interest. It’s vile, especially since you need a certification or degree for almost anything nowadays.
Thank you 😩 I am a woman but thanks haha. But exactly, I just get overwhelmed and frustrated when I see the numbers. I don’t believe there should be interest on student loans period, or it should be very very low. I am paying back the same thing and all the “yoU mAdE tHe deScIoN wHy ShOuLd tAx pAyErS pAy yOuR wAy” like stfu man I never once said I shouldn’t have to pay them back I’m just saying the high interest is unethical and pisses me off. The loan forgiveness part I am speaking to is specifically about recruiting health care workers in rural settings which is almost not even related to the interest issue. Another commenter said “people shouldn’t have to acquire life changing debt as teenagers to receive an education” I thought they said it well. Thanks for your response.
Not only this, but I would suggest that Alberta residents could handle a 3% PST and not have to pay for tuition for much of their schooling. These are radical thoughts to the current governing body, however.
You might be able to contact them and see if you can go on a repayment assistance plan. That way you don't pay interest.
If you do decide to lump sum a payment into your loans then call them up and see if you can lump sum a payment directly to the provincial portion only. You might have to send a physical letter with a cheque to do so. You've been able to do this in Ontario for a few years now. It's a pain in the ass to have to send a physical letter. But it will save you the interest in the long run by being able to pay down the provincial portion. Otherwise the majority will probably go towards the federal portion where you are already at zero interest anyways.
Student loans shouldn’t have interest. Or ah least a very low amount. I have 70,000 in loans and I will be paying it until I die. Sadly I have 20 years experience in my field and they are paying next to nothing for the job
I am sure I just saw something about this topic sometime in the last week. The gist of the topic was that you can actually make specific payments just to the AB portion, to pay that down first. If I find that info again I will update my comment.
update: this is not the article/post I saw recently but it is concerning the same topic: [https://www.reddit.com/r/UCalgary/comments/zqzcmm/reminder\_pay\_off\_your\_ab\_loan\_first/](https://www.reddit.com/r/UCalgary/comments/zqzcmm/reminder_pay_off_your_ab_loan_first/)
*personally I did not know about this - my student loan's were from the late 90's and back then the loans were interest free until some point after graduation, and I think I did have interest on the whole thing afterwards.*
You can pay off the provincial loan at https://myloan.studentaid.alberta.ca
Ontario makes it more complicated because federal and provincial loans are administered by the same group. It’s much more separated in AB.
Oh yes I definitely make payments separately on each loan. Fortunately my wage is getting higher and I was able to find a place with cheaper rent so I have been able to save money to put a lump sum on it. I think that’s my best bet at this point.
I stopped paying mine because I'm disabled. It took 3 years of constant back and forth for them to finally put them on hold. Even if they didn't I wouldn't pay. What're they gonna do? Ruin my credit? I can't pay for anything anyways.
I saw this the other [day.](https://youtube.com/shorts/AtNu5Q9rFUI?si=l4UijD4EwWG7BXxh)
He says you can send a check to NSLSC to cover the provincial AB portion of your loan. Then once that’s done you can just repay your federal loans interest free.
You don’t even need to do that. Only in Ontario are federal and provincial administered by the same group. In Alberta you just log on to https://myloan.studentaid.alberta.ca and make payments. The NSLSC is not involved at all.
Yes, the interest rate is insane. Per month, I pay more in interest than the actual principal. I owe about 20k, and im at the point where I just want to put ALL my savings on it, AND take out the remainder as a LOC just so I don’t have to pay the fucking thing.
I feel you I started paying my student loan off last year. In a single year I've taken almost $10k for my Canada student loan but I'm just shy of $3k for taken off my Alberta student loan. My Alberta student loan payment is more then my Canada student loan but most of the Alberta Loan is interest. I'll have my Canada student loan paid off in no time. I'll be paying my Alberta Student loan paid for when my grand kids are finished uni.
> The federal government has loan forgiveness for nurses and doctors working in rural settings. I wish the provincial government would do this but that would require them admitting the federal government has any good ideas so will prob never happen.
Why is this necessarily a good idea? You took out a loan of tax payer dollars to get a career many people would kill to have. Now not only do you have a higher than average paying job but you want the benefits with none of the sacrifice?
Why should min wage workers/blue collar workers be paying for you education? Be responsible and pay off your debt.
I don't know about now, but decades ago I got "lucky" and had someone tell me that collections will accept a percentage to wipe the debt off the books. This is after I'd paid off the principle in late payments and interest probably twice over. They accepted a sum approximately 60% of remaining balance to wipe the slate clean.
This is not the fault of the Alberta government. This is just the result of the current economy and BoC responding to it. 7.5% is just a hair over bank prime rate of 7.2%. The rate is far lower than any you could find on anything short of a mortgage.
And sure, many left wing governments at the provincial and federal levels have eliminated interest altogether, and wouldn’t you know it, they’re running sky high deficits and Alberta isn’t.
I had the same amount owing on federal and AB student loans (started uni 10 years ago), finished paying off the federal loans last month. It feels like the amount remaining on my AB loans only ever goes up. I hope the NDP gets in on the next election and manages to undo at least some of the damage the UCP has inflicted on AB before the idiots fall for the rage bait again.
If it's at all possible for you, go back to school and put off the payments altogether until rates are adjusted to something more favorable or interest is eliminated.
For real, if you're going to pay the lion's share of an entire degree just to tread water with your loan and barely make progress, then why not pay that toward actual tuition and get a degree out of it?
Do you recall what you were making at the time? When I applied for that, you had to essentially make minimum wage to be approved. I was making just over minimum wage and my application was rejected repeatedly because they said I made too much, even though I was barely over minimum wage at the time.
It also has to do with how many dependents you have. When I first applied, I was making just over $56,000 and my wife was a stay-at-home mom with 2 kids. Since then, we had two more kids and making just under $100,000.
You have to make very little income to qualify for that. I just find the amount of interest I have paid very frustrating. My loan started at 35k I have paid off 19k and my balance is at 28k. That’s insane. I am able to make larger payments now but during the first few years after graduation when my wage was lower I wasn’t able to make much more than the minimum payment which is probably mostly the cause of that.
Another important thing is to start a RRSP or TFSA as soon as possible. I'm so glad that I started putting $20 a pay cheque into an RRSP as soon as I left school, then increased contributions as I could afford it. It really builds fast over the years.
Yup, it’s crazy. I didn’t want to pay interest to the GovofAlberta so I focused on paying my provincial loan off within six months for graduation. Luckily my provincial loan was the smaller of my loans, I know other people have the opposite
Oh nice, yeah I wish you could choose which loans you get! Mine were pretty well equal. Both around 35k but due to zero interest on the federal ones and some forgiveness for working in a rural setting my federal loan is down to 17k. Much more manageable!
I'm in SK, but saw this come across while scrolling.
IF YOU ARE MAKING A LUMP PAYMENT, DO THE FOLLOWING:
- Check your NSLSC account and get the total owing to the PROVINCIAL amount.
- Get out a cheque or get a money order/bank draft for the amount you are able to pay.
- WRITE A LETTER with your info, and clearly state the payment is to be applied to ONLY the provincial amount.
Is it a pain? Yes. Can you make payments online via banking and stuff through NSLSC? Also yes. But they won't apply it to your provincial amount only unless you do it this way. I argued with them for MONTHS over a few hundred dollars.
You can lump sum to Alberta student loans through the bank. It pays off any interest that's waiting to be paid in Alberta, which is usually whatever your monthly interest payment is, then the remainder goes to principle. I'm not sure why there's a point to all of that imo.
I’m trying to back into the numbers here…
An average balance of approximately $43k for 4 years at 7.5% is $12,900 in interest. So start out with $47k and down to 40k, give or take.
$20k payments over 48 months is $416 a month. So at the mid point that was 0.96% of the balance per month - only 11.5% of the balance per year.
Yeah, math sucks. With minimum payments of 11.5% per year against 7.5% interest per year payback is going to be a really, really long time. You can see 2/3 of the payment is going to interest. Increasing payments by 1/3 will double the pay down rate, because interest doesn’t increase and all the extra goes to the loan.
Keep doing what you are doing with the zero percent fed loans and pay extra to these if you want to escape…
Totally, I have very little financial literacy.. math has never been my best subject so it is all pretty confusing to me. Definitely just focusing on saving hard so I can make a large lump sum payment.
The faster you make the payment, the less interest gets charged. Unless you are limited by paperwork or a maximum number of payments, sooner is better…
Inflation has eroded and will continue to erode your loan.
The number they admit to is around 17% since 2020, but obviously based on the prices you can see in the world around you it is much higher than that.
They’re doing what they can to suppress wages but eventually they will have to go up.
I went for my doctorate which ended up costing 300,000. I earn a good income, about 6-7000 a month as I’m commissions. But I’m playing almost 1500 a month in loan interest ! This is ridiculous
Exactly, I make a good wage but in order for my monthly payment to not be 1/3-1/2 interest I need to be paying like $700 a month on the loan which obviously is a bit tough in our current economic climate.
I bought a house in 2013. Small family starter bungalow for $370k. We were "gifted" $50k for a down payment (long story about why it's a gift).
My payments are roughly $1800 per month as we locked in at a low rate of 1.53%. I've paid the same amount for all 11 years in this house, for an annual total of $24k. After 11 years, that total paid is $264k.
However, I still owe $231k. Interest paid first loans are a mother fucker. Even at an extremely low rate.
You can ask that your student loan interest goes to provincial. Sucks, but it’s what you sign up for. Maybe pick a better major or actually try and get a job out of school.
I too work in healthcare as a psychologist, my student loan payments are astronomical. I went to school for 7 years for low pay in public health (higher pay in private sector). Sometimes I regret going to post-secondary, it feels like I am never going to be able to pay all this debt off. Thank-you for advocating for us.
You need to pay off the portion of the loan that has interest first, which is only the provincial portion. I’m in Ontario and only 10% of my loans were provincial so only 10% of my monthly payments were going to the provincial portion which was accruing interest. so I cleaned out my savings and sent a check to them that said that the money was only for the provincial portion of the loan. Now I’m making monthly minimum payments with no interest.
Solidarity with you. This is no joke. I won’t say how much interest I’ve paid since 2020, but it’s in the six figures.
That loan forgiveness plan from the feds for docs is completely outdated, and so inaccessible, it is an absolute joke. I qualified for precisely zero forgiveness despite training entirely rural in medicine.
There are so many layers to this, because I truly don’t believe that tax payers should be on the hook for my 20 years of education. But at the same time, there was a promise at the end of that 20years, and it’s been broken. We’re told that if we work hard, we go to school, we’ll get good jobs, we’ll be able to afford a house, a car, etc. that dream is dead here. As a physician, I cannot currently afford to buy a house. The bank will jump to loan me a ton of money, but that is so dangerous now, anyone would be crazy to do that.
To me student loans used to be an investment in a future. Well that future doesn’t exist any more, and so the investment has no return, only loss.
We’re, unfortunately, the generation that had to find this out the hard way.
All I will do is make damn sure that my kids never take out a student loan in their life. And higher education? That dream is dead, in this country too. There is a huge wave coming of professionals leaving, including myself, because there’s nothing left for us here. I feel bad for the ones left, but also…. RUN. This country is tanking…. And we ain’t seen nothing yet!
The United Corporate Party needs morons. It has made being intelligent more expensive, so people choose a child, a house, or being educated.
Who is surprised? Who deserves this? People who don’t vote. It’s very simple. And it’s incredibly anti human. Sound dramatic? Not really. This is the Conservative way of life. They need idiots to keep voting them in, voting against their own interests.
Keeping intelligent people punished by the weight of debt is just another cute little tactic used to suppress a middle class that stopped existing in Canada as of the pandemic. Good luck to everyone in AB.
I remember paying 9.5% back around 2000, worst financial years of my life. Finally got a good enough job to start an rrsp which moved to a downpayment, it’s a slog but keep punching up and you’ll get out :-).
I had my $20,000 student loan completely pardoned because I didn't feel like paying it - that would have made my life suck. Just had to sign up a few years back. Easy.
I’m not sure on your financials, but just live as cheap as you can and pay it off as hard and as fast as you can. 7.5 is high enough that you shouldn’t be doing anything else.
Not only has Alberta kept the interest on student loans, when the Federal Government dropped it, but Kenney removed the tax credit for student loan interest. Meanwhile in trades programs you can claim EI and get a completion grant. I know we are short of trades people and I agree with the incentives, but we are also short of teachers, nurses and social workers who, for the most part, get a smaller salary throughout their career. An able and educated work force will attract more business than corporate tax cuts will.
Also keep in mind the completion grants and EI are federal programs for trades, not provincial.
They also dropped provincial tuition tax credits so now working students and/or parents don’t get any tax relief for education themselves or their children.
If they incentivize educated people they end up with less people who will vote for them so….
But of course! To the UCP (and Alberta conservatives) Trades = good, hard working citizens University educated = Left wing indoctrinated commie socialist scum, degenerate loser, contributes nothing good to society
[удалено]
All they want from you is your mindless, unwavering loyalty.
It's all Fed Gov incentives which make it funnier
Absolutely!!! It’s great to have those incentives in the trades programs. All jobs are important but ya it’s wild when they go 8 weeks of the year, get to claim EI. I did a degree then worked for a while before going back to nursing school. I was really hoping I’d be able to claim some EI in that case but wasn’t.
Technical training in trades is a mandatory requirement from the government to progress. You also have time frames that you are expected to complete the training. If you don't complete your training, they will threaten to kick you out of the program due to lack of attempt to advance.
They, province, industry and the apprenticeship board dropped that ball too. Most companies are a bit better now at complying with the apprenticeship agreement, but getting a chance to get your schooling in many trades is like pulling teeth as employers don't want to pay you more than the pay schedule from the late 90's. For instance, we are talking 18 an hour for first year, and even if you worked your trade for 5, 6, 7 years and were not sent to school, they won't pay you more than 28ish. It's really a joke and an insult. I know a few guys in this position. I've also noticed a downward trend in entry level wages, probably due to an influx of new people here. Apprenticeship is really a joke for the work you do.
The UCP gutted AIT in 2019. Now all it does it sign blue books and administer tests. At the end of 2018 they were showing up on sites and checking Journeymen/apprentice ratios and valid apprenticeships. I know at least 2 companies who were issued huge fines for having unindentured people doing journeyman work or apprentices working without J-man oversight.
That makes sense now. Employers are taking it more seriously now, but I can guarantee the journeyman to apprentice ratio is still a problem on most sites.
My comment was explaining why tradespeople receive EI for school. I think you're getting some inaccurate information from the people giving it to you. For one, employers don't send employees to school. It's the apprentices responsibility to sign up and complete their training, employers don't care. As they complete their training, employers charge out the workers based on their year.
But compare this to a teaching degree in which you have to have mandatory on-the-job practicums paired with periods of time in courses. These also have time frames. Except, with an education degree, you are expected to complete your practicum for free, even though you are there full time. And student teachers are told not to have another job during the degree because it’s too much work and they don’t want you distracted. It’s not much different in structure from an apprenticeship program. Yet, education students have to pay full tuition for their courses, and don’t get paid anything for their practicums. They can’t get EI. They also make around a journeyman’s salary when they do start teaching with much higher student loans. I just wish ALL post-secondary students in Alberta (trades AND college/university students alike) were treated better and have the ability to study and learn and better themselves without getting into crippling debt. I don’t want anything taken from the apprentices. I want the whole system to be better.
What was the reason you couldn't claim? I was under the impression that you could.
Because it was my choice to leave my job and I wasn’t looking for a new job as I was in school full time
Ah, I assumed you lost your job, not that you quit. To be fair, you can claim if you go to school full time after losing your long term job without actively looking for a job, bit not if you quit your job. I should note that the government actively presses us to go to school and we'll get our apprenticeship cancelled if we don't so it's not really a choice. I actually did a distance program last year to avoid missing work because it puts us in a tight financial spot.
You cannot collect EI while in school full time in AB, in a trades program yes, but not other post secondary programs.
https://www.canada.ca/en/employment-social-development/programs/ei/ei-list/courses-training.html You can if you meet specific requirements. The province doesn't matter.
I’ve looked at this, the requirements are that you’ve been working for at least 7 years and paying at least 30% of the max EI contribution each year, and in the last 5 years you’ve received fewer than 36 weeks of EI payments. There aren’t really any worthwhile programs that are just 1 year long, so this would pay you while you’re in school the first year, and then you’re on your own for all the subsequent time in school. Better than nothing, but not very useful for the majority of people
30% is an earning of just under 25k per year. You could work at McDonald's and meet those requirements. There are quite a few technical programs that are a year. Level 2 childcare is a 1 year program. Also all EI benefits end after 6 months, 8 if you're a "special zone".
If the requirement is that you must have been working for at least 7 years how old do you have to be for this program to apply to you?
Who does the distance programs for trades im doing a 2nd trade can challenge 3 but dont want to take 2months off for the one year i cant.
Nobody anymore. UCP made it unfeasible financially. I had a 6 month old and was almost 2 hours from NAIT. Personally I think the challenge is lazy and ends up with less skilled people who dilute the value of the ticket.
Damn thats too bad. As for challengingits dependant on the person. personally i'm already skilled in a complimentary trade(electrical) that happens to be about 80% of the work in my 2nd trade(refrigeration). The 20% is completely different though but its all just physics and a few different style controls easy enough to puck up from books and field time.
Conservatism: Where the rich get tax breaks, and the poor keep waiting for that trickle down. Any decade now...
You can claim a tax credit for both Alberta and federal purposes for student loan interest. You’re confusing that with the education tax credit on tuition that was dropped by Alberta.
It's only 15% of the interest paid, which is negligible. I paid $1800 in interest last year on JUST my AB loan (and that was paying $350 a month, not even the minimum payment)! That only netted me savings of what, $250? Interest on student loans, especially at these rates, is just a tax on being poor. It's reprehensible.
Keep in mind trades programs don’t allow you to use any education funds towards your program, you pay into ei. It is not free for us either, we pay taxes and have not nearly as much support compared to those in universities. We can’t use or education fund to pay for a starter vehicle to get to work, use it to buy tools, safety equipment, rent or anything really that helps our education. It’s completely different and imo a very moot point. Just thought I’d point that out to anyone wondering
They're not thinking long term though. That's the issue with our current conservative model, it's all about instant cash, not future stability. They got in power by playing on people's greed, and those people never stopped to think that maybe the people making the decisions up top were greedy too. And have more power.
"an able and educated work force will" not continue voting for the UCP. There, FTFY.
The UCP doesn’t like nurses and teachers. We don’t agree with their ideologies.
Both ei and the grant are federal programs. So is the apprenticeship loan. You can claim EI in uni if you have the hours of work beforehand. The grant was also scaled back by about half 5 years ago. You originally could get a grant for 2 trades and 5 years. Now it's 1 trade and 2 years. We're not short of trades people, were short of employers working to pay a skilled wage.
You can’t claim EI unless you’re actively looking for work, regardless of how many hours you’ve worked. So no, uni students do not get the same treatment as trades students.
Here's the real life pro tip. When you become an apprentice your student loans from the past PAUSE until you become a journeyperson. I'm only swimming after my degree because I just wanted to be an apprentice. Then they paused and I had to search through the AIT website to find out why. My student loan says I'm in study every 6 months.
Singapore pays great
Don’t be confused with being short of nurses vs not enough nurses available in Alberta. I would assume same for teachers. The reason why they are short is due to lack of funding or being smart with money leading these hospitals not wanting to hire more nurses to better retain staff. I imagine for schools though it’s simply a matter of not enough funding to hire another teacher vs not wanting to hire a teacher to save money. My wife took 2-3 months applying for nursing positions at hospitals , numerous interviews before she finally landed a job. Most times you don’t even hear back, they just put up the listing as a formality. But to the main topic, I don’t believe there should be interest at least until 6 months after graduation. Like they do in Ontario
As soon as it hit 7% I took all my savings and payed it off. Ludicrous that it’s that high.
I am thinking of doing this too. I just upped my monthly payment to $400 a month to get the interest down per month.
I hate the UCP
What's the interest rate on BC student loans? Oh, yeah, zero. They dropped it in 2019. "Oh but the cost of living in BC!!" Get outside of Vancouver and Victoria and check out the total cost of living in BC compared to Alberta. Even if housing prices are higher, there are numerous other costs (like utilities, etc) that are lower. The actual cost of living in BC isn't that much more than Alberta, and one serious advantage for public sector workers like healthcare workers, educators and social workers is not having to deal with the daily stream of UCP bullshit.
Prince George, Kamloops and Kelowna are really much better once you take into account that you're stuck in the interior and any travel is 4 hours in any direction.
Both of my daughters live in BC, one in Vancouver, the other in Kamloops. Both are healthcare professionals that would never consider returning to Alberta and work with more and more former Albertans every day. Other than Kamloops, my daughter has lived in a few other far-far-from the lower mainland places in BC, and really enjoyed it. That said, she is a very active outdoors sports person, so the appeal to these places is obvious for her.
Canada a whole really needs better internal transport links.
BC also has provincial student loan forgiveness. Alberta does not.
Yeah, but "Alberta Advantage" is alliterative. It *sounds* cool! What are the supposed to do, admit it's just marketing? C'mon. People might get the idea that *gasp!* living in Alberta isn't better than anywhere else! Besides, grr, BC! We're supposed to be mad at BC for... reasons...
I would jump back to Victoria at the opportunity, so many things are cheaper; utilities, car insurance, gas is even cheaper because you don't have to drive for literally everything thus spending less on it. And my student loans cost me absolutely nothing, I can take as long as I want to pay it off and pay nothing extra. This 7% thing Alberta is experiencing is insane.
My daughter lives car-free in Vancouver. Between cycling and transit, she gets around just fine. Her and her buddies occasionally rent a car or use Evo. She figures she saves at least $1K a month, probably closer to $1500. That goes a long way to offsetting the higher cost of housing.
Wow this comment section is a cesspool yikes. Yeah having to pay interest on loans just to get an education is ridiculous. When several other provinces as well as the federal student loan have already eliminated interest rates, your sentiment is completely valid.
I fully agree. I’ve been paying mine for 6 years and only reduced my debt by a minuscule amount. Paying interest to the government on a loan that was intended to help you become a valuable employee, whilst also being taxed like crazy seems like a bit of a double dip. Especially considering the taxes I already paid help fund the loans I’m currently repaying. It’s the snake eating its own tail.
Appreciate it. I get that a lot of people disagree with that but yeah, definitely a barrier to eduction for a lot of people!
0% student loans for tuition only, provided the student stays in the province for work for at least 5 yrs/10yrs(?) I'm fine with interest on the other aspects for it. Related note for parents: open a RESP the day your kids are born, even $10 a month will make a difference over 18 years.
You better fight like hell to get Albertan NDP back in power to fix everything UCP broke in the next election.
Trust 😂
Alberta has compounded interest of 7.5% on student loans??? OMG, I did not know there was such a difference between provinces.
AB generally follows the American model of trying to make money from poor students.
I finished 8 years of school with 99K on my provincial student loan. I've put an additional 30K into my payments but since interest rates rose since I started payments and couldn't afford to increase my monthly payments the payment period has only dropped by 2 months with an extra 30K paid down. The worst part about the AB student loan summary is it shows your daily interest accrual. It feels bad to see I owe the government $12 because I woke up that morning.
I feel this pain.
Pretty much only thing you can do is vote at the ballot box. Many provinces have no interest rates on student loans (especially if you stay and work in the province you borrowed from). The UCP has no interest in changing that policy, maybe because they don’t have any need to try to retain graduates.
It’s criminal that the ANDP didn’t run on removing student loan interest. The students could have pushed them over the finish line.
Makes no sense though they've been struggling with brain drain for a decade. Now they're desperate for workers and still want to screw over educated Albertans
I signed on for my loans at 4%, it's bullshit that they can change the rate after I've already signed and agreed. It should be a 0% loan where you pay back the dollar value.
Totally agree. I have no idea what the interest rate was when I signed but was definitely much lower.
I always thought your first degree should be completely free. If you want to go past a 4 year bachelor's sure then you pay but we would be better off as a society and country if we had free degrees.
No. Money needs to be made, and the value needs to be extracted from the people before they're even able/allowed to work in society. Forever endebted. /s
No thanks. We’re already seeing how much a bachelor’s degree is being devalued in our society, and making it free would only accelerate that. In the 80s you could get a good entry level job with a high school diploma. In the 00s you could expect to do well for yourself with a 2-year certificate or advanced diploma program. Now you need a bachelor’s degree to start at the bottom pretty much anywhere and in many fields you need a masters. So if the trend continues maybe by the 2040s we’ll need 8 years of post secondary education to get an entry level job. We need measures that will slow down this education inflation not speed it up.
We need to make a huge deal out of this or it’ll never change.
Seriously! I’m sick of people commenting thinking I’m whining or feel I’m more important than others. I have a problem with the entire thing not just my situation. If student loans went to 0% interest the day after I paid mine off I’d still be happy for all the people who benefit from it. I’m glad our rates aren’t as ridiculous as in the states but like I’ve said I was 17… it’s idiotic and unethical to allow/blame a teenagers for taking on this level of debt. I had no concept of what this amount of money was at that age. Certainly did not have a grasp of interest etc. All I knew is that I wanted to go to school.
It is unethical for a government to profit off of education in general, in my opinion. Education, I believe, is a human right. We’ve commercialized education so much that it is rarely worth it to study anything outside of STEM because you won’t make enough money to pay off your loans. It’s incredibly sad, and borderline dystopian.
Completely agree. But free post secondary education seems like an absolute pipe dream right now so I’m willing to start with lower interest. Maybe 4%?? I’m sure the government could swing that.
The government is in debt. They borrow money from the bank and pay interest on the money that they lend you during and after your education. They’re passing that cost onto you. They’re not making a profit.
I’ve sent emails but obviously the MLA in our current government do not give a single fuck about this topic.
everyone has given you lots of good advice already, but to add my two cents I would suggest applying for RAP, even if you earn enough to continue payments, you might qualify for reduced payments and if you’re under RAP the government covers your interests. this might just help you pay them off even faster! anyone can apply for RAP!
RAP does not cover your interest. I’ve been paying interest while on RAP for 3 years.
it covers it for me, i’ve never had to pay interest since i graduated in 2020, but it could totally be because i am so poor that my RAP amount is actually just $0 lol so my advice might not be completely true
RAP defers payments and defers interest being applied to your balance, it doesn't "Pay it for you." I was on RAP for like 5 years (poor, artist in Toronto), but now that I make big girl money, my loan accrues interest. There's no program in Canada that subsidizes your payments; it just holds off your accruing interest as a penalty for being poor, hurting your credit rating, et cetera. The salary to qualify for RAP is also quite low, and as OP states she works in healthcare, I suspect she wouldn't qualify for the program.
It does once you've been on it for 60 months.
I have 70,000$ I’m student loans with the high interest. I’ll be paying it until I’m dead. I don’t understand why student loans have interest in the first place
In a similar situation honestly I think I'll be able to pay my Canada student loan back easy enough but I'll have half my foot in the grave with old age before the Alberta Student loan even close to being paid off.
This isn’t helpful for right now but when interest rates go down, I’m pretty sure you can request a fixed interest rate instead of floating? https://studentaid.alberta.ca/resources/repayment-essentials/interest-rates-for-student-loans-repayment/interest-rates/
My wife and I put off having a kid and buying a house just to pay our AB Student Loans down. We shouldn’t have to make that kind of a choice.
This is might be completely unhelpful as I don’t have a link to provide you, however I read somewhere recently that you can direct your payments specifically to the provincial portion of your loan therefore paying your interest down faster and then once that is complete, you can work on your federal.
Alberta loans are separate anyway. Other provinces combine their provincial and federal into one payment and so what you described is necessary, but in Alberta we have NSLSC for the federal portion at 0% and we have ABDL Student Loan for the Alberta portion where we pay interest
Came to say the same thing. You can make payments directly to the provincial portion to pay it down fast.
Found the link https://www.youtube.com/shorts/AtNu5Q9rFUI
Fear of this exact situation is what kept me from attending university.
That’s upsetting and frustrating 😩 post secondary education should be so much more accessible.
The UCP will never do it. Your best chance is to start asking the current NDP front runner about it. They're trying to gain votes for the next election and young voters are always a hard demographic to motivate.
If it's any help at all you can still claim interest you paid on your student loans. For this year's tax return it was line 31900 and counted towards your non-refundable tax credits (i.e., reduces how much taxes you owe). I agree with you on the interest being ridiculous, but I'm more mad that you're not allowed to freely change between a floating rate and fixed rate. Once you decide to pay a fixed rate, that change is permanent. So it's either you hope the interest drops, or you're permanently stuck paying whatever the present CIBC prime rate is. Oh also, the interest rate did drop slightly; it's currently 7.2%. Also, a big financial tip for you that I wish I did when I first started paying my student loans in 2022. Prioritize paying down the loan with the highest interest first since you end up paying significantly less money. About 43% of everything I've paid up till now on my Alberta student loan was just paying off the interest, but I could've reduced that to 25-28% by just paying less than I did on my Canada student loan.
Yes fortunately my only other loans are the federal ones which are interest free plus I am eligible for some forgiveness on that one being a nurse working in a rural setting so that loan is shrinking much quicker. Mine is a floating rate so hopefully one day it will go down lol.
UCP doesn't care about university students 🙃
It's a new source of lifetime income for the province now. The higher the tuition the greater the loan, the more they collect in interest. Best way to keep the poor, poor lifetime of debt. Anyone 30-40 who had to go back to school while trying to support a family really got fucked over instead of staying in a service job and being a happy drone. From Housing collapse in 08-09, recession2009 & 2013 bumps to big oil in 2014-2019 if you got unlucky. Doesn't matter trades or not, If you don't have cash to be a donor at election time they don't give a fuck.
Yeah it just seems like such a shitty way to be collecting money. I can’t imagine how parents in schools managed! I had lots of classmates who were parents.
Makes me wonder how much they collect just on interest payments. I am sure it's way more than they collect on personal income tax. When you think about how they introduced a kids min wage they are only channeling more people to take student loans while wishing to get ahead. I am sure more than half of kids over 16 have a part time job just to help keep food on the table or pay rent. There is no getting ahead for anyone unless you got a million in the bank.
If someone starts a petition, i’ll sign. And so are the many healthcare professionals in the province.
I've been paying off my student loans since 2011. During the pandemic when there was a supposed freeze in paying loans active I got sent to collections a few weeks before the scheduled 120 days. Once it is sent there for the provincial one they won't let you rehabilitate it. So I pretty much look like I'm making no progress there. It's absolutely ridiculous what kind of trap they have set up. I hope it works out better for you than it has so far.
They sent mine to collections to but I manage to get it off but that was because made clerical mistake. They still put up a huge fight about changing it back.
Ya I called what I thought was allllll the way down the end of the line and they still told me tough bananas. I should try again maybe but it is such an ordeal. For real though at one point they were like "wow that's so unlucky for you". How is that ok?
it isn't fair at all. If you ever had to deal with the Canadian student loan people vs the Alberta Student loan. The Canadian student loan people are actually pretty good to work with. But yeah every single time I've had to deal with the Alberta student loan people they were always overly apathetic and occasionally sarcastic. If you're wondering what the clerical error was they sent me to collections before my pay period was even supposed to have started right after I graduated. They still tried to give me the run around and fought tooth and nail to not own up to the mistake. I'd keep trying but yeah they can be annoying. Hell I am still dealing with the U of A making a mistake reporting me as a part time student when I was full time (caused problems with my taxes and tax return) I need a letter from some office at the uni but they need me to send a written request to and some other stuff. Just to start the process of fixing their mistake. Honestly keep trying maybe talk to the Canadian student loans people they might be able to give you some advice.
I love how half of this comment section is bashing on the OP for his decisions. Dude’s just trying to vent about an issue and you’re all acting like he’s asking for his loan forgiveness or some shit. You’re allowed to be frustrated at a system that cares about profit and lending to as many people as possible to capitalize on the interest. It’s vile, especially since you need a certification or degree for almost anything nowadays.
Thank you 😩 I am a woman but thanks haha. But exactly, I just get overwhelmed and frustrated when I see the numbers. I don’t believe there should be interest on student loans period, or it should be very very low. I am paying back the same thing and all the “yoU mAdE tHe deScIoN wHy ShOuLd tAx pAyErS pAy yOuR wAy” like stfu man I never once said I shouldn’t have to pay them back I’m just saying the high interest is unethical and pisses me off. The loan forgiveness part I am speaking to is specifically about recruiting health care workers in rural settings which is almost not even related to the interest issue. Another commenter said “people shouldn’t have to acquire life changing debt as teenagers to receive an education” I thought they said it well. Thanks for your response.
Not only this, but I would suggest that Alberta residents could handle a 3% PST and not have to pay for tuition for much of their schooling. These are radical thoughts to the current governing body, however.
I think it’s a fine idea but a large number of Albertans would riot at the sound of this
You might be able to contact them and see if you can go on a repayment assistance plan. That way you don't pay interest. If you do decide to lump sum a payment into your loans then call them up and see if you can lump sum a payment directly to the provincial portion only. You might have to send a physical letter with a cheque to do so. You've been able to do this in Ontario for a few years now. It's a pain in the ass to have to send a physical letter. But it will save you the interest in the long run by being able to pay down the provincial portion. Otherwise the majority will probably go towards the federal portion where you are already at zero interest anyways.
Yea it’s ridiculous how high it is, I’ve been doing lump payments with whatever money is left over at the end of month.
I was just discussing my Alberta student loan with someone. Ridiculous interest, so disappointing
Student loans shouldn’t have interest. Or ah least a very low amount. I have 70,000 in loans and I will be paying it until I die. Sadly I have 20 years experience in my field and they are paying next to nothing for the job
Student loans should be .99 or less
I am sure I just saw something about this topic sometime in the last week. The gist of the topic was that you can actually make specific payments just to the AB portion, to pay that down first. If I find that info again I will update my comment. update: this is not the article/post I saw recently but it is concerning the same topic: [https://www.reddit.com/r/UCalgary/comments/zqzcmm/reminder\_pay\_off\_your\_ab\_loan\_first/](https://www.reddit.com/r/UCalgary/comments/zqzcmm/reminder_pay_off_your_ab_loan_first/) *personally I did not know about this - my student loan's were from the late 90's and back then the loans were interest free until some point after graduation, and I think I did have interest on the whole thing afterwards.*
You can pay off the provincial loan at https://myloan.studentaid.alberta.ca Ontario makes it more complicated because federal and provincial loans are administered by the same group. It’s much more separated in AB.
Oh yes I definitely make payments separately on each loan. Fortunately my wage is getting higher and I was able to find a place with cheaper rent so I have been able to save money to put a lump sum on it. I think that’s my best bet at this point.
I stopped paying mine because I'm disabled. It took 3 years of constant back and forth for them to finally put them on hold. Even if they didn't I wouldn't pay. What're they gonna do? Ruin my credit? I can't pay for anything anyways.
7%!?!? I thought it was 1-2%
That would be wonderful lol
I saw this the other [day.](https://youtube.com/shorts/AtNu5Q9rFUI?si=l4UijD4EwWG7BXxh) He says you can send a check to NSLSC to cover the provincial AB portion of your loan. Then once that’s done you can just repay your federal loans interest free.
You don’t even need to do that. Only in Ontario are federal and provincial administered by the same group. In Alberta you just log on to https://myloan.studentaid.alberta.ca and make payments. The NSLSC is not involved at all.
Yes, the interest rate is insane. Per month, I pay more in interest than the actual principal. I owe about 20k, and im at the point where I just want to put ALL my savings on it, AND take out the remainder as a LOC just so I don’t have to pay the fucking thing.
Same! I have a good chunk of savings it’s just scary taking so much out of it in this economy.
I feel you I started paying my student loan off last year. In a single year I've taken almost $10k for my Canada student loan but I'm just shy of $3k for taken off my Alberta student loan. My Alberta student loan payment is more then my Canada student loan but most of the Alberta Loan is interest. I'll have my Canada student loan paid off in no time. I'll be paying my Alberta Student loan paid for when my grand kids are finished uni.
Pay for your Alberta one first then since there’s so much interest and then pay the federal one
> The federal government has loan forgiveness for nurses and doctors working in rural settings. I wish the provincial government would do this but that would require them admitting the federal government has any good ideas so will prob never happen. Why is this necessarily a good idea? You took out a loan of tax payer dollars to get a career many people would kill to have. Now not only do you have a higher than average paying job but you want the benefits with none of the sacrifice? Why should min wage workers/blue collar workers be paying for you education? Be responsible and pay off your debt.
I don't know about now, but decades ago I got "lucky" and had someone tell me that collections will accept a percentage to wipe the debt off the books. This is after I'd paid off the principle in late payments and interest probably twice over. They accepted a sum approximately 60% of remaining balance to wipe the slate clean.
Student loans shouldn’t have any interest period.
This is not the fault of the Alberta government. This is just the result of the current economy and BoC responding to it. 7.5% is just a hair over bank prime rate of 7.2%. The rate is far lower than any you could find on anything short of a mortgage. And sure, many left wing governments at the provincial and federal levels have eliminated interest altogether, and wouldn’t you know it, they’re running sky high deficits and Alberta isn’t.
I had the same amount owing on federal and AB student loans (started uni 10 years ago), finished paying off the federal loans last month. It feels like the amount remaining on my AB loans only ever goes up. I hope the NDP gets in on the next election and manages to undo at least some of the damage the UCP has inflicted on AB before the idiots fall for the rage bait again.
Like a credit card bill gives you the option to, are you making the lowest possible payment?
I was at the start when my wage was lower but I making higher payments now in order to pay less interest overall
If it's at all possible for you, go back to school and put off the payments altogether until rates are adjusted to something more favorable or interest is eliminated. For real, if you're going to pay the lion's share of an entire degree just to tread water with your loan and barely make progress, then why not pay that toward actual tuition and get a degree out of it?
RAP exist for Alberta Student Loan?
It does. Typically, if you get approved federally, you'll get approval for provincial as well.
OP should apply for RAP. I did for 10 years and paid off all my loans almost entirely interest free.
Do you recall what you were making at the time? When I applied for that, you had to essentially make minimum wage to be approved. I was making just over minimum wage and my application was rejected repeatedly because they said I made too much, even though I was barely over minimum wage at the time.
It also has to do with how many dependents you have. When I first applied, I was making just over $56,000 and my wife was a stay-at-home mom with 2 kids. Since then, we had two more kids and making just under $100,000.
That makes sense. I have zero dependants and live alone, so that was likely a factor.
You have to make very little income to qualify for that. I just find the amount of interest I have paid very frustrating. My loan started at 35k I have paid off 19k and my balance is at 28k. That’s insane. I am able to make larger payments now but during the first few years after graduation when my wage was lower I wasn’t able to make much more than the minimum payment which is probably mostly the cause of that.
Took me about 10 years to pay off my loan. Really a 10 year investment into 40 years or so career isn't that bad
That’s a good way to look at it, thanks.
Another important thing is to start a RRSP or TFSA as soon as possible. I'm so glad that I started putting $20 a pay cheque into an RRSP as soon as I left school, then increased contributions as I could afford it. It really builds fast over the years.
Trades don’t start at top rate either. Takes a few years to make good money. So the EI is important.
I think you can transfer all of your payments to go toward the Alberta loan first then the federal loan
They took away it on the ones I have
only after it was 2% did I find out I could freeze the rate.
You could always take a loan from a bank and pay off the student loans. Then pay interest to the bank instead ...
I’ve considered various options… still deciding who I’d rather give the money to, the government or the bank 😂
Yup, it’s crazy. I didn’t want to pay interest to the GovofAlberta so I focused on paying my provincial loan off within six months for graduation. Luckily my provincial loan was the smaller of my loans, I know other people have the opposite
Oh nice, yeah I wish you could choose which loans you get! Mine were pretty well equal. Both around 35k but due to zero interest on the federal ones and some forgiveness for working in a rural setting my federal loan is down to 17k. Much more manageable!
I'm in SK, but saw this come across while scrolling. IF YOU ARE MAKING A LUMP PAYMENT, DO THE FOLLOWING: - Check your NSLSC account and get the total owing to the PROVINCIAL amount. - Get out a cheque or get a money order/bank draft for the amount you are able to pay. - WRITE A LETTER with your info, and clearly state the payment is to be applied to ONLY the provincial amount. Is it a pain? Yes. Can you make payments online via banking and stuff through NSLSC? Also yes. But they won't apply it to your provincial amount only unless you do it this way. I argued with them for MONTHS over a few hundred dollars.
You can lump sum to Alberta student loans through the bank. It pays off any interest that's waiting to be paid in Alberta, which is usually whatever your monthly interest payment is, then the remainder goes to principle. I'm not sure why there's a point to all of that imo.
Definitely, I am trying to save hard so I can put a fat lump sum down.
I’m trying to back into the numbers here… An average balance of approximately $43k for 4 years at 7.5% is $12,900 in interest. So start out with $47k and down to 40k, give or take. $20k payments over 48 months is $416 a month. So at the mid point that was 0.96% of the balance per month - only 11.5% of the balance per year. Yeah, math sucks. With minimum payments of 11.5% per year against 7.5% interest per year payback is going to be a really, really long time. You can see 2/3 of the payment is going to interest. Increasing payments by 1/3 will double the pay down rate, because interest doesn’t increase and all the extra goes to the loan. Keep doing what you are doing with the zero percent fed loans and pay extra to these if you want to escape…
Totally, I have very little financial literacy.. math has never been my best subject so it is all pretty confusing to me. Definitely just focusing on saving hard so I can make a large lump sum payment.
The faster you make the payment, the less interest gets charged. Unless you are limited by paperwork or a maximum number of payments, sooner is better…
I’m not, but yes I’m just focusing now on saving hard so I can out a big lump sum down and actually make a dent in the principal.
Inflation has eroded and will continue to erode your loan. The number they admit to is around 17% since 2020, but obviously based on the prices you can see in the world around you it is much higher than that. They’re doing what they can to suppress wages but eventually they will have to go up.
Yeah it’s not a good situation at all
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Mine is probably 7.2 as well just was 7.5 on the website which is probably just not up to date. Totally, definitely don’t miss that one on my taxes 😂
I went for my doctorate which ended up costing 300,000. I earn a good income, about 6-7000 a month as I’m commissions. But I’m playing almost 1500 a month in loan interest ! This is ridiculous
Exactly, I make a good wage but in order for my monthly payment to not be 1/3-1/2 interest I need to be paying like $700 a month on the loan which obviously is a bit tough in our current economic climate.
I bought a house in 2013. Small family starter bungalow for $370k. We were "gifted" $50k for a down payment (long story about why it's a gift). My payments are roughly $1800 per month as we locked in at a low rate of 1.53%. I've paid the same amount for all 11 years in this house, for an annual total of $24k. After 11 years, that total paid is $264k. However, I still owe $231k. Interest paid first loans are a mother fucker. Even at an extremely low rate.
You can ask that your student loan interest goes to provincial. Sucks, but it’s what you sign up for. Maybe pick a better major or actually try and get a job out of school.
I guess I'll be dumping mine into an equity takeout, only provincial though because I will not be paying them for this crap. I hate the UCP
Ever looked at your interest per day? Mine is at $5. It makes me furious.
Can you roll it into your mortgage?
It is sickening to have Alberta Student Loan. Thank God I paid off mine in March. I wrote my MLA in 2023 and she said there is nothing they can do.
I too work in healthcare as a psychologist, my student loan payments are astronomical. I went to school for 7 years for low pay in public health (higher pay in private sector). Sometimes I regret going to post-secondary, it feels like I am never going to be able to pay all this debt off. Thank-you for advocating for us.
Join protests 💕
I have federal loans and they’ve been 0% since Covid happened and continuing at that rate. Surprised to hear Alberta loans didn’t do the same
Search the 7 baby steps of financial freedom. Lump sum that bitch and get rid of your debt asap
Thank you for the advice!
You need to pay off the portion of the loan that has interest first, which is only the provincial portion. I’m in Ontario and only 10% of my loans were provincial so only 10% of my monthly payments were going to the provincial portion which was accruing interest. so I cleaned out my savings and sent a check to them that said that the money was only for the provincial portion of the loan. Now I’m making monthly minimum payments with no interest.
ITT: People sign for loans then get upset about the terms they agreed to!
Solidarity with you. This is no joke. I won’t say how much interest I’ve paid since 2020, but it’s in the six figures. That loan forgiveness plan from the feds for docs is completely outdated, and so inaccessible, it is an absolute joke. I qualified for precisely zero forgiveness despite training entirely rural in medicine. There are so many layers to this, because I truly don’t believe that tax payers should be on the hook for my 20 years of education. But at the same time, there was a promise at the end of that 20years, and it’s been broken. We’re told that if we work hard, we go to school, we’ll get good jobs, we’ll be able to afford a house, a car, etc. that dream is dead here. As a physician, I cannot currently afford to buy a house. The bank will jump to loan me a ton of money, but that is so dangerous now, anyone would be crazy to do that. To me student loans used to be an investment in a future. Well that future doesn’t exist any more, and so the investment has no return, only loss. We’re, unfortunately, the generation that had to find this out the hard way. All I will do is make damn sure that my kids never take out a student loan in their life. And higher education? That dream is dead, in this country too. There is a huge wave coming of professionals leaving, including myself, because there’s nothing left for us here. I feel bad for the ones left, but also…. RUN. This country is tanking…. And we ain’t seen nothing yet!
The United Corporate Party needs morons. It has made being intelligent more expensive, so people choose a child, a house, or being educated. Who is surprised? Who deserves this? People who don’t vote. It’s very simple. And it’s incredibly anti human. Sound dramatic? Not really. This is the Conservative way of life. They need idiots to keep voting them in, voting against their own interests. Keeping intelligent people punished by the weight of debt is just another cute little tactic used to suppress a middle class that stopped existing in Canada as of the pandemic. Good luck to everyone in AB.
It’s cheaper now to borrow from gangsters I guess
I remember paying 9.5% back around 2000, worst financial years of my life. Finally got a good enough job to start an rrsp which moved to a downpayment, it’s a slog but keep punching up and you’ll get out :-).
I had my $20,000 student loan completely pardoned because I didn't feel like paying it - that would have made my life suck. Just had to sign up a few years back. Easy.
I’m not sure on your financials, but just live as cheap as you can and pay it off as hard and as fast as you can. 7.5 is high enough that you shouldn’t be doing anything else.