A report came into our newsroom over the weekend about some student loan debts being paid off anonymously. 

One viewer told us that his credit score jumped by 20 points recently and when he looked into it, his student loan accounts were paid in full. 

News Ten spoke with a South Louisiana Community College (SLCC) official about if this could happen. 

Robin Winston, Interim Director of Financial Aid at SLCC, says she hasn’t known of someone paying off a student’s loans anonymously before. 

“The students when they go online and fill out their master promissory notes, entrance counseling, all of those items are securely done on federal site. So no, no one can actually come in here and ask to pay off a student loan, and we would give them any information to do that,” added Winston. 

Winston says student loans are given out by the Department of Education and transmitted securely from a school to the institution. 

“The banks used to be involved in student loans,” Winston explained. “They have not been involved in student loans in many years so no, there’s no way that they can go to a servicer which are across the country and ask someone ‘we just want to pay off loans.'” 

Some further research showed some student loan accounts can show as closed on credit reports when the account is being transferred to another agency. 

“The only thing that I can think of someone calling in and saying that they think it was a donor that if they were trying to consolidate their loans,” said Winston. “Their credit report would show that their original loan was paid off and a new loan would show there so that could be other options that maybe that’s what was seen on the credit report.”