An SLB horror story

The Editor, Sir:

I write this letter to relate my experience, and to warn others who may find themselves in the same situation, because of what I consider may really be an unfortunate piece of psychological victimisation, abuse and deceit by an institution whose purported function is to provide assistance for needy students.

Briefly, my son's application to the Students' Loan Bureau (SLB) last year, for a loan to pursue a course of study at UWI, was approved and he has now completed his first year of the three-year course and is looking forward to embarking upon his second year. He has done very well and is proving himself worthy of the loan being granted to him.

A friend and I are guarantors for this loan. I am 61 years old and will be 62 in September of this year.

When all the paperwork was being done last year, I was given the impression that everything was approved and OK. I was even able to say that I am the proud owner, free and clear, of a concrete house, and that I am employed full-time and drive my own vehicle - which is still the case.

Too old

A little over two weeks ago, I went to the SLB to drop off a Guarantor Update form (for my friend who is the other guarantor and who, incidentally, is younger than I am). The officer looked at the form and asked me to have a seat. I was then told, quite plainly, that I am too old and can no longer be a guarantor, so I would have to find another (younger than 60) guarantor by August, or else they could no longer continue the loan for the rest of the course - and that would be that for my son's student loan!

I asked if there was anything that could be done, or someone higher up that I might speak with in this regard, as I would quite likely be unable to find another guarantor in this short space of time. I was quite nicely but plainly again, told, "No. There is no use speaking to anyone else and nothing that can be done, but you have until August."

Now, if upon getting the loan approved last year, I had been told (warned) that I was in fact "too old", then I may have found or tried to find another way, or I would have had time to gather my resources and explore other avenues during the entire time that my son was happily going through his first year. But I had no idea whatsoever about this policy. In fact, when the loan was approved for the first year, I was then almost 61 years old - and the policy, as I was told when I went there two weeks ago, is that once one turns 60, he or she cannot be a guarantor, period! And it had nothing to do with money or anything else, but age.

Please, think about it

If the policy is that after 60-years-old, one cannot be a guarantor, then why was my son's loan approved in the first place, when I admitted and proved my age at that time to be almost 61? Could it be possible that their approval of the loan, in the first place, was a slippery little move to just take a small chance that I won't drop dead in one year, in order to make me, my son or the other guarantor, liable to start paying back the loan NOW, when my son has to leave UWI prematurely because I can't be a guarantor any more? My son drops out, without a degree or a job, and is suddenly liable now to start paying back the loan - which he cannot, so I am obliged to as his too-old guarantor? Think about it.

This cannot be right or ethical, and I am actually hoping that someone at the SLB, who cares (what does this mean any more, really?) and might feel that I have a case and they could help, will see this letter and that something will be done to make it right. If we could afford to hire a lawyer, we would not be in the position of needing this loan, but I think that I could surely do with the assistance of a lawyer, now.

We are honest and trying people, like any other ordinary Jamaicans, who would like to keep believing that some Jamaican institutions are what they purport to be, and not something else a lot less tasteful.

I am, etc.,

L. DUPERROUZEL

Kingston 10