Sallie Mae Customer Service

Phone Number & Contact Information

800-472-5543
Toll-free·Calls Existing Student Loans·Most popular Sallie Mae number
Q:How do I get a live human at Sallie Mae?
A:Repeat "Agent" until you are transferred.
Q:Does Sallie Mae offer 24 hour customer service?
A:Not at this number; hours here are Mon-Fri 8am-8pm EST. The least busy day is Wednesday, and the most busy day is Tuesday. Details
Q:How long will I have to wait on hold?
A:The average hold time is 16 minutes. The longest hold times are on Tuesday, and the shortest are on Monday.
Read below for more aboutother numbersgetting a repmenuspromptshold timesbusy timescommon issueslive chat

More Sallie Mae Customer Phone Numbers

855-756-5626 - New Student Loans
Toll-free · Direct to a human ·

How do I get through the phone menu to a real live person?

GetHuman researchers routinely call this Sallie Mae phone number to document the phone system.
Here is our latest tip for weaving through the phone menu to get to a real person the fastest: Repeat "Agent" until you are transferred.
Here is how our research team describes the way the Sallie Mae phone system greets you: For federal student loan payments, press 1.
Below are some clips we've found from Sallie Mae's phone menus and tips that help give an idea of what you will encounter when you call. We've highlighted why they are important as well:
They may ask your reason for calling (instead of a menu)
"Thank you for calling Sallie Mae. Calls may be monitored and or recorded. As part of your experience with us, we will be collecting some of your personal information.
Learn more by accessing our privacy policy at sally may dot com slash legal slash privacy.
In order to assist you, please tell me why you're calling today."
Excerpt from a call with Sallie Mae
Saturday, March 23, 2024 2:50 PM
They may ask you to say or enter information
"You can say things like make a payment or status of an application."
Excerpt from a call with Sallie Mae
Saturday, March 23, 2024 2:50 PM

What are the hours and when should I call?

Sallie Mae operates the call center for this 800-472-5543 phone number Mon-Fri 8am-8pm ET. The short answer is that you should call on a Wednesday. This observation and the following section are based on analysis of a sample set of 127 calls made in the last 90 days using our free, web-based phone (see above).
An important note: busy times vs hold times vs best time to call
When we refer to busy or less busy times, we are talking about the volume of calls. The busiest times are when the most people are calling this Sallie Mae phone number (least busy times have fewer people calling). This high call volume does not necessarily mean that you will have a long hold time when you call. Companies like Sallie Mae staff their call centers differently based on the time of day and day of the week, so you may experience a shorter wait on hold at the busiest of times. When we refer to the best time to call, we are referring to the optimal combination of lower call volume and shorter wait times.
The least busy time to call
The least busy day to call Sallie Mae is Wednesday. The most busy day to call is Tuesday, which averages 264% more phone calls by comparison. Again, this is based on a sample of 127 calls made with our AI-powered, web-based phone in the last 90 days.
Mon
Tue
Busiest
Wed
Quietest
Thu
Fri
The shortest wait on hold
We measured the shortest hold times to be on Monday. The longest wait in the queue on average occurs on Tuesday.
The best time to call
In summation, the best day to call Sallie Mae is Wednesday. This is not the day with the shortest wait on hold in the phone system, but we still recommend it for its ideal combination of low call volume and short hold times. Plus we believe that Sallie Mae staffs the call center well on Wednesday.

Why call this Sallie Mae number?

Below is a sample of recent calls to Sallie Mae, and their purpose. Are any of these similar to the reason you are trying to call?
Seeking student loan information: "I'm trying to get some information for my daughter to help her with student loans."
- From a call lasting 12m 50s , Feb 28, 2024 7:13 PM

My Experience Calling 800-472-5543

Jan 30, 2024

I have had a student loan for quite some time, but since I was straight out of college at the time I was able to defer it while I looked for a permanent job. However, I now have a good job and a regular paycheck and it's time to take care of this loan. I have heard about how high-interest fees can get, and I want to get ahead of things the best that I can. Therefore, I figured the best thing I could do was call Sallie Mae and talk to them about what my options are. 

There are a lot of student debt programs, but I've heard that most of them are in lieu so I'm not sure what I'm applicable for right now. That's why talking to someone is probably the best option. Of course, Sallie Mae probably has hundreds of thousands of loans, so I figured that doing it this way would mean that I would have to wait for a while to talk to someone. It did take me about twenty minutes, but it was worth it to talk to someone in person. 

When I first called, an automated agent stated, "Thank you for calling Sallie Mae. Calls may be monitored and recorded. As part of your experience with us, we will be collecting some of your personal information. Learn more by accessing our policy at Sallie Mae/legal/privacy.  To assist you, please tell me why you are calling today. You can say things like make a payment or status of an application."

I responded, "Loan deferral," and then it stated, "To help us locate your loan, please enter your social security number, account number, or administrative ID." I entered my social security number twice, but I think that the system was picking up background noise at the same time which confused it because it couldn't find my account. It ended up saying, "I’m sorry we could not confirm your information. Please wait while we transfer your call."

This wasn't the worst thing, because then I was transferred to the hold line to talk to someone which is what I wanted. As I stated, it was about twenty minutes and then I was able to talk to an agent who was able to find my account and talk about my options. It turned out that I did have a few months left in my deferral which gives me some time to think about the structured payment plan that I want to pick up and to think about my options. The agent was friendly and I would call again if I had any other questions.

Adam has been tirelessly trying to help customers find the best tips and tricks to get through phone trees and writing many guides for prickly customer service problems. He's been featured in the Wall Street Journal, Inside Edition and Bloomberg.

More Ways to Contact Sallie Mae Customer Service

There are of course other ways to contact Sallie Mae customer service besides the phone. Below we list the best ones, by medium.
Live Chat
https://www.salliemae.com/contact-us/ - Customer Service
Use this link to connect with customer service via chat
If phone-based customer service is not available, or the wait times are long, many people prefer chat as a next-best option. Some even prefer it to calling on the phone. Luckily, Sallie Mae provides this option.
Sallie Mae's website
https://www.salliemae.com/contact-us/ - Customer Service
Use this link to find customer service help through their website
As a last, sometimes only, resort- Sallie Mae customer service can be accessed through their website. This can entail digging through help articles before finding a form and "being allowed" to submit a problem to their team, and rarely leads to a real-time conversation, which is why GetHuman does not recommend this unless it's the only way.

Conclusion and closing notes

This is Sallie Mae's best phone number, the real-time current wait on hold and tools for skipping right through those phone lines to get right to a Sallie Mae agent. This phone number is Sallie Mae's best phone number because 4,692 customers like you used this contact information over the last 18 months and gave us feedback. Common problems addressed by the customer care unit that answers calls to 800-472-5543 include and other customer service issues. Rather than trying to call Sallie Mae first, consider describing your issue first; from that we may be able to recommend an optimal way to contact them via phone or web or chat. In total, Sallie Mae has 2 phone numbers. It's not always clear what is the best way to talk to Sallie Mae representatives, so we started compiling this information built from suggestions from the customer community. Please keep sharing your experiences so we can continue to improve this free resource.

GetHuman does not provide call center services or customer support operations for Sallie Mae. The two organizations are not related. GetHuman builds free tools and shares information to help customers of companies like Sallie Mae. For large companies that includes tools such as our GetHuman Phone, which allows you to call a company but skip the part where you wait on the line to get a live human rep. We continue to work on these tools to help customers like you (and ourselves!) navigate the messy phone menus, hold times, and confusion with customer service. As long as you keep sharing it with your friends and loved ones, we'll keep doing it.

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