Initiative to speed distribution of
Financial Aid refunds at Lincoln Land
Community College
LLCC becomes the 12th
institution of higher education in
Illinois partnering with Higher One to
distribute refunds
New Haven, CT –
October 23, 2008 - Higher One, a
financial services and payment company
focused exclusively on higher education,
announced it has partnered with Lincoln
Land Community College to distribute
financial aid refunds to students. LLCC
is the 12th institution in
the state of Illinois to distribute
refunds through Higher One’s OneDisburse®
Refund Management®.
“The program
sounded like an excellent opportunity
for our students and the College,”
explained Karie Longhta, Controller at
LLCC. “It’s a win-win
situation. Students will no longer have
to wait to receive their refund checks
through the mail, and much of the manual
labor for our staff will be eliminated.”
Prior to its
partnership with Higher One, LLCC
distributed paper check refunds to
students through the mail. This process
was both time and labor intensive.
With Higher One’s
OneDisburse Refund Management, students
are given increased choice in how they
receive their refunds including: direct
deposit to the OneAccount, a no minimum
balance, no monthly fee, FDIC-Insured
checking account provided by Higher One,
and an ACH transfer to a bank of the
student’s choice.
For the College,
this new process means less work during
the distribution process. The
institution simply provides Higher One a
flat file of students receiving refunds
and the amounts of each. LLCC then sends
Higher One a wire for the total amount
of the refund disbursement. In addition
to the distribution process, Higher One
markets the program to students,
collects and protects student banking
information, handles any returned
payments, and fields any refund related
customer service inquiries.
Based on the
complete service Higher One offers an
institution, administrators at LLCC felt
that the partnership was in the best
interest of the students and the
College.
“We actually did
consider [building] an internal system,
but the more we heard about Higher One
and all the bells and whistles the
program offered, we decided to go with
them,” stated Longhta. “The program will
offer students more refund options and
relieve the Business Office of
collecting and storing student banking
information.”
LLCC will begin
distributing refunds through Higher One
in February 2008.
“I am hoping the
students will be much happier,” said
Longhta. “They will be able to receive
their money faster and it should greatly
reduce phone calls to the business
office.”
About Lincoln
Land Community College: LLCC serves
residents of the largest community
college district in the state of
Illinois, with convenient campuses in
Springfield (main campus, Springfield
East Campus, Capital City Training
Center) and regional centers in
Taylorville, Jacksonville, Beardstown,
Litchfield and Hillsboro. Excellence in
teaching and student-centeredness are
hallmarks of LLCC. Approximately 17,000
credit and non-credit students take
classes and workshops at LLCC each year.
Classes are offered days, nights and
weekends as well as a growing number of
online courses. With a 17-to-1
student/faculty ratio, LLCC professors
know their students and work hard to
help them succeed.
About Higher
One:
Founded in 2000,
Higher One provides higher education
institutions and their students with
efficient, convenient and easy-to-use
solutions to handle financial
disbursements. These include: student
refunds, on-campus and community
purchases, payroll and employee
expenses, as well as the collection of
payments from students, parents, and
sponsors. Higher One offers a suite of
online banking services including the
OneAccount, an FDIC-Insured checking
account, OneCard, a Debit MasterCard®
and OnePay, a service that allows
electronic collection of tuition and fee
payments. Higher One was recently ranked
# 12 on Entrepreneur Magazine’s 2008 Hot
100 List. Higher One is based in New
Haven, CT.
