A private student-loan company that has criticized a competitor for accusing financial-aid administrators of accepting bribes from lenders is offering administrators an all-expenses-paid trip to the Caribbean.

EduCap Inc., a nonprofit lender that does business as Loan to Learn, sent a letter inviting administrators to a four-day “Education Summit” next February in the West Indies on September 5, five days after the company issued an “open letter” responding to an advertisement that sharply questioned the integrity of financial-aid officers.

In the ad, the loan company MyRichUncle claims that some financial-aid administrators accept “kickbacks” and “payola” from lenders who wish to become exclusive providers of loans on the administrators’ campuses. The ad advises students to ask aid administrators, “Do you accept any inducements from any lenders on your list?”

Loan to Learn’s response to the ad did not mention MyRichUncle directly, but said that financial-aid administrators, “many of whom have spent their careers looking out for the best interests of students, do not deserve to be attacked as part of a marketing campaign.”

The dispute is playing out against the backdrop of a boom in private loans for students and a vigorous competition among lenders for preferred treatment by colleges.

According to the invitation to Loan to Learn’s summit, which was posted on Tuesday on the Web site of the New America Foundation, the conference will feature “presentations and discussions with an array of eminent leaders from the worlds of business, education, technology, government, media, and culture.” It will also include “sessions on how Loan to Learn can help your school and students.”

The foundation has estimated the value of the February trip to be more than $3,000 per person, based on the cost of airfare, food, and three nights in the cheapest type of room at the conference hotel, the Four Seasons Nevis resort.

Loan to Learn was founded by Catherine B. Reynolds, a philanthropist who served on the federal Commission on the Future of Higher Education.