Last week, the White House indicated that the pause on student loan repayments, initiated during the Trump administration at the onset of the pandemic, will not be extended and that borrowers with balances due will be expected to resume payments in February. This comes after an almost two-year break from both payments being due and interest accumulation on those loans, all at significant cost to taxpayers. In a moment of unprecedented uncertainty, putting a pause on student loan repayment wasn’t an unreasonable move. While the break was a boon for many highly educated workers who never lost their employment during the service sector-focused downturn, it also provided much-needed relief to those who unexpectedly faced sudden and considerable losses at the hand of COVID-19. But the return to normalcy on this front is overdue. The Federal Student Loan program, which manages more than 90 percent of all outstanding debt in the economy, has generous protections that allow borrowers who are still in difficult financial circumstances to make reduced payments (sometimes no payments) until their economic condition improves. (These existed long before the initial pause on payments initiated by COVID-19.)

This news might come as a disappointment to those who were hoping that Biden would use the option for another extension to the pause as a way to punt on the issue of student loan cancellation. Instead, this offers another indication that, despite a campaign promise of a $10,000 forgiveness plan, President Joe Biden isn’t keen on moving ahead on loan cancellation without legislation (nor does he seem supportive of the notion regardless of the political mechanism for getting there).

The existence of income-driven repayment programs, which allow borrowers with low income relative to their debt to make reduced monthly payments and ultimately have their debt forgiven, should allow us to feel confident that the resumption of repayment won’t create undue hardship on borrowers. But the reality is that bringing close to 50 million borrowers back into repayment will likely pose some administrative challenges that could compromise the effectiveness of this already brittle program. The challenge is made even greater by the fact that some of the largest student loan servicers ended their contracts with the Department of Education during this almost two-year pause on repayment and the borrowers they previously served will now need to engage with a new company they’ve likely never heard of before they can resume payments on their loan.

The Federal Student Loan program is a behemoth that shouldn’t be stopped or started on a dime. Unfortunately, that’s exactly what we’re about to do, and unless the White House steps up with some big plans for supporting this challenging transition, we’re likely to see some major problems as we bring the program back online.

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