There have been some significant developments to the federal student loan program during the pandemic as a result of the CARES Act, which was signed into law on March 27, 2020. 

The CARES Act temporarily suspends payments on the following student loans that are owned by the Department of Education (ED):

• Defaulted and non-defaulted Direct loans
• Defaulted and non-defaulted FFEL loans
• Federal Perkins loans

The automatic suspension does NOT apply to any other student loans, including:

• FFEL loans held by commercial lenders
• Perkins loans held by a school
• Private student loans

The payment suspension lasts from March 13, 2020 until September 30, 2020. In addition to the payment suspension, all covered loans have their interest-rate set to 0% during that same time period.

Read the full story here.