Does the direct loan program have the processing capacity to handle all these direct loan consolidation applications on top of all the new FFEL loans they are taking on. My guess would be no - they are not prepared. The direct loan program is going to have to spend a lot of money to ramp up to consolidate a lot of loans that are not profitable - for anyone, including the DOE. It is a very expensive program and the direct loan program is going to become much more expensive to operate than it has in the past - leaving the DOE to turn to private lenders to get in to help with processing and to share in the costs.