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WASHINGTON (AP) — The Education Department says it may reconsider its decision to move the servicing of $1.3 trillion in federal student loans to a single provider.
The department announced Tuesday that while student borrowers will have access to a single user platform, backend customer services could be provided by either one or multiple contractors.
The department had said in May that it would be switching to a single contractor. That decision came under criticism from some Republican and Democratic lawmakers and student debt groups. They argued that relying on a single contractor eliminates competition and could cause that provider to become too big to fail.
The Education Department will engage industry groups in designing the new system. A decision on how many contractors to use will be made in the coming months.
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