Why did UND contract with Higher One to issue excess financial aid and other refunds?
The University of North Dakota was interested in expanding electronic funds disbursements in order to provide students a faster way to receive their excess financial aid and other refunds. In addition, UND was also interested in streamlining the refund process, which had been labor intensive, costly, and inefficient. By streamlining the process, Student Account Services staff will be able to spend their time providing quality customer service to our students. Since there are students that are unable to obtain a bank account, UND needed a vendor that could provide those students an account to receive their refunds electronically. In addition, UND did not want to encourage the use of credit cards. Higher One offered those students selecting the OneAccount with Higher One (Easy Refund) a Debit Mastercard®, not a credit card. Higher One’s clear focus on higher education, experience with other schools and their expertise in navigating the changing regulations governing the disbursement of f
