Due to student complaints about Western’s use of Higher One for refunds, the company has revised several policies.
The restructuring of Higher One is aimed to be implemented June 30, 2012. 
The changes involve: a waive of the 50-cent transaction fee for the first four pin based transactions and warnings after each charge, installing a 24/7 outdoor ATM for students to use, reducing the inactivity fee from $19 to $10 and waiving the 40-cent transaction fee that Western pays to use the program.
Important changes address students no longer signing up for their refund choice on the Higher One website and Western no longer associating its branding with the card, Anna Ellermeier, Associated Students president, said in an email.
On Feb. 14 all Western students received an email from Student Financial Services Supervisor Bob Putich with an update from Richard Van Den Hul, vice president for business and financial affairs at Western, and Ellermeier about the upgrades Western is making to Higher One.
The new changes will also include an educational course on debt counseling and financial literacy for students, funded by the approximate $12,500 that will be saved from the waived transaction fee, according to Putich’s email.
Western junior Victor Celis, a task force member, said the group was assembled by Van Den Hul and Ellermeier to address student feedback about Higher One.
“We saw a lot of backlash and student disappointment in the decision to go with Higher One,” Celis said.
Some of the main concerns include a 50-cent fee that is charged every time a Higher One Choice Card is used as a debit card, the $19 inactivity fee for not using the card, the “aggressive” advertising Higher One uses and privacy concerns about shared financial information, Celis said.
Western sophomore Mitchell Abston said he received a Higher One Choice Card in the mail during the summer of 2011. He activated it because he thought it was mandatory due to the emails Western sent out, but the only time he used it this year was to buy a burrito.
When using the Higher One refund system, there are three options for receiving the refund: direct deposit, having a check sent to a home address or using the Higher One Choice Card, which allows students to use an allotted amount of refunded money like a debit card, Celis said.
Abston said he preferred Western’s previous method of sending checks in the mail, because he doesn’t like owning multiple cards.
“I don’t like it,” Abston said. “It is adding another freaking card to add my money to.”
“We saw the different common areas where we needed to make improvements that were really necessary for the students to feel more confident about [Higher One],” Celis said.
Higher One provides services to more than 770 public and private higher education institutions around the country, according to the Higher One website. Their services offer resources such as refunds, payment plans and electronic billing.
Western began using Higher One in September 2011 in order to outsource the refund disbursements and improve services to students, Van Den Hul wrote in an email. He said the university wanted to make the refund system digital to save time and money associated with generating refund checks.
The ability to use Higher One applies to everyone, not just those with financial aid or scholarships, Celis said. The university will refund students for reasons such as dropping a class, he said.
After proposing changes to Higher One, the company was responsive to the task force’s requests, Van Den Hul said. Higher One started addressing the requests immediately and is working with Western to make the changes.
“This is a new program being developed as a pilot project for Western,” Van Den Hul wrote. “The pilot project will be developed to our specifications.”
In a recommendation report, the task force recognized four main areas that cannot be addressed through the Higher One revisions, Celis said.
The remaining concerns are that the university is not making students aware of changes in a timely manner and is sharing information with a third party company. Other concerns include Higher One's marketing practices and fees that are too expensive and should be reduced or eliminated.
“I’m happy with what we’ve seen. I think it’s really great progress, and it gets to the core of all the issues,” Celis said.
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