Who is MEGS Associates Inc?

We are a small company that has recently begun a national marketing effort highlighting our primary service, the discharge of student loans. Michael Gates Sr. is the owner and President of MEGS, and has been in business in the Houston, Texas community for many years. Under the business MEGS Tax Service, Mike has been a respected accounting and tax preparation professional for over fifteen years and has lived in the Houston area for 31 years. Prior to his financial services experience, Mike worked as an Efficiency Expert and Business Management professional both as an employee and consultant for corporate entities large and small. Before that, Mike served as a Cryptologist in the United States Navy during the Viet Nam conflict with a very high level Top Secret Clearance. He is also currently an Honorary Chairman of the Republican Business Council, a respected American Legion Member, and a husband of 31 years with three children and 10 grandchildren.

Mike’s Story:

So how did an accounting and tax preparation professional begin to help people with their student loan debt? The same way many people learn about little known solutions; he had his own student loan problem. In 2003 Mike’s IRS Tax Refund was kept by the US Department of Education to be applied towards a defaulted student loan from over ten years prior that Mike had been sure was paid off in full. To his great surprise and dismay, his roughly five thousand dollar loan was now a thirteen thousand dollar defaulted debt! Upon investigation, Mike found his old loan had been bought and sold to several lenders over its life, as many student loans are, and had in fact apparently been paid off all but about nine hundred dollars. Perhaps the confusion lay with the many changing of lenders. That balance, with late charges, transfer and collection fees, and interest had grown into a monster much larger than the original loan amount had even been. After several inquiries, Mike was simply told that even though it hadn’t shown up on the radar of the US Department of Ed or his own credit report in all those years, that he was still fully responsible for paying it off now and would not receive any of his subsequent tax refunds until it had been remitted.

Obviously, for a financial professional with a background in digging for the truth, this was unacceptable to Mike. Even if he had left a balance of under a thousand dollars by mistake, he had never been notified of this and felt it unjust to have to pay such a large sum now because of it. Mike then set out to fix the problem. His original goal was not to get the loan discharged, as he was at that time unaware that this was even a possibility. The lender and governmental agencies certainly didn’t tell him this was possible, and in fact often stated just the opposite. However, after nearly two years of researching, establishing key contacts within the student loan lending industry and at the US Dept of Ed itself, many filings of paperwork and appeals, and a great deal of perseverance, Mike achieved success. In fact, beyond his original goal of getting the thirteen grand knocked back down to around nine hundred, Mike had learned that due to several little known laws and rulings and the loopholes they create, he not only got the entire loan discharged and removed from his credit report, but then received a refund of all the original payments towards it that he had made, over $5,000 worth!

In the subsequent years since then, Mike has honed and perfected the process while helping first some of his family and friends with their student loans, and then many of his existing tax clients or those referred to him. After achieving this kind of success for over three hundred people, whether or not this was a service that could be replicated consistently was no longer a question. In a short time, word of mouth brought more and more business of this nature, and Mike decided it was time to form a new branch of his company and begin offering this service to people all over the nation.

Mike’s Pledge:

Mike would like you to know that he is a real person with a legitimate service. Due to the nature of this service, it is easy for our potential clients to be skeptical at first, or for us to win the endorsements of governmental agencies or organizations that are heavily influenced by big business dollars (and there are few powerful industries with more money to throw around than the lending industry). However, Mike invites anyone to call or email him directly with questions or to check his own personal background. He still operates his tax preparation business as well, and therefore must remain in compliance every year with the strict IRS certifications and requirements. He is also an Authorized E-File Provider with a current assigned Electronic File Identification Number (EFIN), which requires a clean business history with no wrongdoing and a regular FBI conducted background check. Due to the recent change of corporate structure to accommodate the focus on the student loan discharge service, and due to the move to a newer, better located office site, MEGS Associates Inc is still undergoing the process of acquiring a listing with the Houston Better Business Bureau. However, even as current non-members, they will report on local companies that have received complaints or been involved with wrongdoing. MEGS Associates Inc, MEGS Tax Service, or Mike Gates personally has never had such complaints or been charged with any wrongdoing whatsoever. Mike pledges to any prospective client that he will personally do whatever is necessary to earn their trust and provide a solution to their student loan matters, and if unable to do so, then let them know up front without collecting or charging any fees. This pledge extends to the local Regional Managers and Sales Representatives hired to represent Mike and MEGS Associates nation-wide.

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