PTPTN looking at other ways to recover money

KUALA LUMPUR: The National Higher Education Fund Cor­poration (PTPTN) is talking to NGOs on how it can best recover payments from defaulters.

According to PTPTN chief executive officer Agos Cholan, the corporation was appealing to defaulters to come forward to discuss loan restructuring programmes.

“We know that they might have commitments or difficulties. We are not asking them to pay everything back at once.

“If they discuss with us how much they can afford to pay, we can then rework their repayment schedule accordingly,” Agos told reporters during the PTPTN Merdeka Raya goodies distribution at the Sungai Besi toll plaza here yesterday.

On Monday, Second Education Minister Datuk Seri Idris Jusoh announced that PTPTN would be collaborating with Bank Negara to include PTPTN loan defaulters into the Central Credit Reference Information System (CCRIS).

The proposal triggered a chorus of protests from NGOs and political parties, and ended with the Cabinet disagreeing with PTPTN’s plan to use CCRIS.

Since its inception in 1997, PTPTN has approved loans for 2.17 million students, of which 17,387 have been exempted from repaying their loans after obtaining first-class honours.

As of July this year, 418,094 people have yet to repay their PTPTN loans amounting to RM2.8bil.




(Source: The Star, 24 August 2013)