Maryland college savings nightmare nears resolution
Maryland 529 automated system complete
For months, FOX 5 has been telling you about the nightmare situation families who were counting on a Maryland college savings plan to pay for their child’s tuition have experienced. FOX 5's Tom Fitzgerald spoke to Maryland's new treasurer about fixing the issue.
BETHESDA, Md. (FOX 5 DC) - For months, FOX 5 has been telling you about the nightmare situation families who were counting on a Maryland college savings plan to pay for their child’s tuition have experienced.
Some account holders didn’t get their earned interest, while others got too much. Now, Maryland's Treasurer Derek Davis tells FOX 5, they’ve reached a milestone in cleaning up the mess.
Davis told FOX 5 that as of Monday, Aug. 21, the automated recordkeeping system for the Maryland 529 prepaid college trust fund is complete. That’s a big relief for families whose college savings has been stuck in limbo.
Maryland Treasurer Derek Davis says the Maryland 529 meltdown has caused real pain and stress to the affected families.
Starting Monday, Maryland 529 account holders are finally able to access their information and benefits online.
The online system has been down for months.
Maryland 529 whistleblower says he warned agency about negative impacts to parents' accounts
A whistleblower and former longtime employee of Maryland 529, the state agency that provides college savings plans for families, is telling FOX 5 about the concerns he shared with leadership of the agency, which has come under scrutiny after hundreds of parents say they could not access the funds in their savings accounts.
Maryland 529 account holders haven't been able to access their account balances, check their benefits or accrued earnings. The general assembly shut down the state agency that had run Maryland 529 when the problems were discovered.
Davis took over the troubled program and told FOX 5 the Maryland 529 meltdown has caused real pain and stress to the affected families. Accounts have now been made whole and fixed, but that doesn’t change what happened.
"The reality is they have bills to pay! And the money was their money," Davis said. "Through that unfortunate turn of events, they weren’t able to access that money, so they had to make alternative plans to get it and that just wasn’t right."
Parents struggle to access Maryland 529 funds after earnings calculation changes
A whistleblower and former longtime employee of Maryland 529, the state agency that provides college savings plans for families, tells FOX 5's Katie Barlow about the concerns he shared with the leadership of the agency, which has come under scrutiny after hundreds of parents say they could not access the funds in their savings accounts.
The private board that ran Maryland's 529 college savings program was dissolved by the Maryland General Assembly, and the $1 billion fund was handed over to the state treasurer, Davis, to fix, and find out how it broke.
Davis said poor accounting practices, like manual interest tabulation were part of the problem, but today’s reopening of the online website is just phase 2 of a four phase plan to restore Maryland 529.