To date, I've missed at least 8 months of payments, because the agency said they were
recalculating my payments, they were transferring my loan, they put my loan in deferment for half time school attendance, and who knows
why they didn't take payments in February and March????? I've come to the conclusion that the Department of Education goal is go hike my payments up and interrupt as many automatic payments as possible, in order to prevent me from getting anything forgiven on my loans.
If you find that the monthly payment is very easy to follow (or if you expect a few guaranteed windfalls throughout the payment period, which translates into more funds coming your way),
why not
recalculate it to come up with the maximum monthly payment that you are confident that you will be able to meet?