FAFSA Changes

As described in our September 27th update, the ED announced the NSLDS system issue has been resolved. Borrowers who were incorrectly switched from Independent to Dependent have self-corrected. 

The ED relayed that they have implemented the paper corrections functionality and have begun processing corrections to paper forms. They estimate that paper corrections received to date will be completed by the end of October, after which paper corrections will be processed within 7-10 days of receipt.

Additionally, the ED communicated that they are now processing 2024-25 FAFSA paper applications within 7-10 days or less of receipt. The ED is also reprocessing a small number of paper applications that encountered issues during initial processing. They relayed that they will communicate with these applicants if further information is needed.

The ED previously announced that they estimated the processing of corrections to paper forms to be complete by the end of September. They have now announced that they are diligently working with the vendor to complete the remaining paper correction functionality, but have encountered issues in testing that the vendor needs to address before this is made available later this month. ED is also exploring other manual workarounds to be able to process paper corrections prior to the full functionality being deployed.

The ED also continues to process paper FAFSA applications but is experiencing some lag in processing time. The current timeline for processing 2024-25 paper FAFSA applications is within a month of submission, but the ED is adding resources to bring the processing time back to 7-10 days within the next two weeks. The ED is also aware of a small number of paper applications facing issues in processing and is working to expeditiously resolve these issues. Please see our August 19 and May 22 updates for additional details.

The ED announced an issue that has caused some federal student loan borrowers to be incorrectly identified as Dependent in the National Student Loan Data System (NSLDS). This issue impacts 5,478 borrowers who are under the age of 24, but who are Independent for various reasons. The issue results in inconsistencies in determining aggregate loan limit totals, as displayed in the NSLDS system, and has caused some 2023-2024 FAFSAs to be incorrectly flagged for exceeding aggregate loan limits. The issue will be resolved mid-to late October when NSLDS begins receiving 2024-2025 demographic data from the FAFSA Processing System (FPS). UWF does not believe we have any impacted students, but if received an exceeding aggregate loan limits task, and believe this is an error, please reach out to finaid@uwf.edu or your assigned Financial Aid Counselor to request a review.

1. The first issue involves conflicting information (see our June 17 update for more details). As previously announced June 17, 2024, conflicting information is created when FTI and manual tax data input are present on the same FAFSA. As a result, schools have been federally required to collect documentation from students and contributors to resolve the conflicting information. The ED now indicates they will reprocess those FAFSA applications once a permanent fix is implemented. At that point, schools will not be required to collect documentation from those impacted FAFSA applicants. Until the ED announces the permanent fix to their systems, UWF will continue to collect documentation from students and contributors as applicable.

2. The second issue occurs when assets for the student (or their contributors) are both collected by the FAFSA form and subsequently used in the Student Aid Index (SAI) calculation even when they meet criteria under the law for an exemption from reporting assets (see appendix E for when assets are required to be used in SAI calculation). The ED now indicates they will reprocess those FAFSA applications once a permanent fix is implemented; however, a timeframe has not been provided by the ED. At this time, UWF does not have a way to identify individual students that may be impacted from assets being calculated in their SAI in error. If you believe you are an impacted student, please reach out to finaid@uwf.edu or your assigned Financial Aid Counselor to request a review. Once a permanent fix is implemented by the ED, UWF will receive an updated FAFSA (and possibly corrected SAI), and we will automatically review to make any required changes to financial aid packages.

The ED announced they have corrected the Pell Grant eligibility data in the COD System. Schools can now submit 2024-2025 Pell Grant records, and schools can resubmit any records that were previously rejected in error.

The ED announced  they are aware of a reoccurring issue in which some FAFSA records have blank SAI fields and do not contain reject codes. This issue is similar to the issue that required records to be reprocessed in June. The ED has identified a small number of records where this issue persisted in new records that were initially processed after mid-June. These records will be reprocessed by the ED this week and will be identified with the “04” reprocessing code.

The Department of Education (ED) announced their Common Origination and Disbursement (COD) System is rejecting Pell Grant origination records. The ED stated the system issue arose on August 18, 2024. As of today, August 28th, there is not a viable workaround for schools nor is there a resolution timeframe. What does this mean? Depending on when your FAFSA was received by UWF, your Pell Grant funds may not be disbursed in a timely manner for fall 2024. Please note that since this is a systemic issue with the ED's system, this is not an isolated incident at UWF. All schools that participate in Title IV funding have been impacted. The Office of Financial Aid & Scholarships is working closely with the Student Accounts & Cashier's Office to ensure affected students are not assessed penalty fees or removed from coursework (if applicable). 

The ED previously announced that they estimated the processing of paper applications would be completed by the end of June. The ED subsequently announced on July 30th that it would be another two to three weeks. However, as of August 19th, the ED announced they now anticipate completing the processing of paper FAFSA forms by the end of August. Please see our May 22 update for additional details.

As an update to our May 3rd posting (please review for background information), the ED announced an interim solution for students that indicate they are an eligible noncitizen on the FAFSA form; however, the student's immigration status was not verified by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) during the primary match process. These students are currently "pending" a secondary match. As mentioned in the May 3rd update, the secondary match process with the DHS is not currently available, so schools were unable to "search cases" to potentially move forward. As of August 8th, the ED indicated to mitigate the issue, a temporary change will now allow schools access to pending DHS secondary match cases. Schools will be able to view the cases in the SAVE system to submit the student's documentation for review to proceed with third-step verification. However, schools will still not receive an updated ISIR (i.e., institutional record of the FAFSA) and the secondary match will remain in "pending" status. Schools must allow at least 15 business days from the date the third-step verification request was sent to the DHS before anticipating a formal third-step verification response from the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS). If a formal response is not received back from the SAVE system, UWF will be unable to move forward unless we have documentation from the student that is clearly defined by the ED as acceptable documentation confirming eligible noncitizen status. 

The FAFSA form requires financial information not included in the FTI brought over via the FA-DDX . For this reason, when resolving conflicting information in situations where an applicant or contributor had FTI data and also manually indicated they did not file a U.S. tax return in 2022, schools must follow the updated guidance to request appropriate documentation to provide accurate responses to the required additional fields (i.e., foreign income excluded from taxation, pension rollovers, IRA rollovers, and Earned Income Tax Credit ). Not all income and tax information is transferred via the FA-DDX as FTI. As a result, it is incorrect for schools to assume that any of the additional fields are “0” if they are blank on the ISIR transaction the school is attempting to correct. Schools should review previous corrections that were submitted prior to July 24, 2024 and made without acceptable documentation or without completing all the updated steps to determine if they must be revised.

The ED announced that schools will be unable to submit school-initiated corrections through batch processing, and the functionality will not exist until the 2025-2026 FAFSA cycle. Batch processing allows financial aid professionals to more quickly, efficiently, and accurately submit FAFSA corrections in bulk, and is ordinarily available when the FAFSA application goes live, typically on October 1. Without batch corrections, along with all other schools, UWF must manually submit corrections for individual students, which is a laborious process. As mentioned in prior ED updates (i.e., May 10, June 18, July 1), students that have been selected for verification, have conflicting information, or have submitted Professional Judgment Appeals may be impacted by this unexpected administrative burden.

The Department revised the instructions with additional steps for resolving conflicting information when an applicant or contributor who had FTI data reported on the ISIR also manually indicated that they did not file a U.S. tax return in 2022. The revision is that schools are required to collect appropriate documentation prior to submitting a correction to the FAFSA Processing System (FPS).

Although schools should have had access to submit FAFSA corrections by the "end of June", the ED announced the federal systems are not ready. The ED announced functionality should be released "in the next few days". Further, the ED said it will be "at least a week" before it begins fully processing paper FAFSAs.

As an update to the May 10th notice, the ED announced schools will be unable to make FAFSA corrections through batch institutional corrections until the "first half of August". In "late June" schools should be able to make corrections directly to the federal system; however, this process would be on an individual student-level basis. Meaning, students selected for verification or submit a Professional Judgment Appeal may be impacted by this delay. 

The ED announced they will begin processing 2024-2025 paper FAFSA forms by the end of June. Once processed, students who submitted a paper FAFSA form and provided a valid email address will receive an email telling them that they can access their FAFSA Submission Summary on StudentAid.gov. Students who did not provide a valid email address will receive the results of their form’s processing via a paper FAFSA Submission Summary sent by postal mail within 7-10 days after processing. However, the ED strongly encourages students and contributors to complete the FAFSA online rather than completing a paper form. If an applicant first completes a paper FAFSA and subsequently completes the online application, the online FAFSA will supersede the paper application. 

As of May 17, 2024, The ED announced that all affected FAFSA applications have been reprocessed and sent to schools (see the April 1 update for more information). UWF waived the associated requirement for affected students on May 17th. Additionally, the ED is continuing to review "a small number of potential issues" and will provide resolutions as soon as "this week". There are still a small number of FAFSAs without a calculated SAI and no rejection code and missing verification flag indicators, which should also be resolved "this week". 

As of May 10, 2024, the ED announced that schools will be unable to make FAFSA corrections until "late June". Schools will be able to submit corrections via the federal system by the end of June, but this will be on an individual student-level basis. Meaning, we cannot send files and must submit corrections through the federal system for each applicable student that requires corrections. Schools will be unable to send batch correction files for several weeks following the end of June. Students that are selected for verification or submit Professional Judgment Appeal may be impacted by this delay. 

Currently, schools are unable to view or resolve cases that are pending review under the secondary match process. Schools that attempt to resolve DHS match flags related to an applicant’s eligible noncitizen status will receive a “No Cases Found” message. As a result, there could be situations in which UWF cannot determine eligible noncitizen status, and we must wait for a new system-generated ISIR before attempting to verify eligible noncitizen status in SAVE. Unless a student's eligible noncitizen documentation is clearly defined by the ED as acceptable documentation in the current guidance, we must wait until the secondary DHS match process is available. 

As of April 30, 2024, the ED announced that "nearly all" impacted FAFSAs with various issues have been reprocessed. Please allow 7 to 10 business days for UWF to receive the corrected FAFSAs and to view any updates to your financial aid file. The ED also announced that once a FAFSA form is submitted, the ED is sending to institutions within 1 to 3 days of submission.

Additionally, the ED announced applicants and contributors without a Social Security Number (SSN) may now immediately access the online 2024-2025 FAFSA form after creating a StudentAid.gov account. Manual entry of 2022 tax information will be required. Users who request a StudentAid.gov account and cannot validate their identity using the knowledge-based questions (as generated by TransUnion) must still complete the manual process to validate their identity. Students without an SSN must verify their eligible noncitizen status through their school before they receive any federal funds.

Complete announcement: Update on Access to the 2024-25 FAFSA Form for Individuals Without a Social Security Number

UWF started receiving small batches of 2024-2025 FAFSAs from the Department of Education (ED) mid-March. The ED indicated they will continue to send small batches of FAFSAs to schools and will gradually increase the volume over a series of weeks. Once the ED is processing at full capacity, they have indicated it will take two weeks to process the backlog. As of today, UWF is pending systems updates and subsequent testing prior to processing FAFSA data. Tentatively, we will start processing the FAFSAs received from the ED by mid-April. We will start creating financial aid packages for incoming students by late April or into early May.

As of April 15, 2024, the ED announced that student-initiated corrections are now widely available to applicants and their contributors. Students who need to make corrections or who choose to make additions or changes to their FAFSA forms should return to StudentAid.gov to complete those updates. Students should typically be able to review their updated FAFSA Submission Summary within 1 to 3 days of their submission of a correction.  For information on submitting corrections, please see How To Correct or Update Your FAFSA Form.

As of April 9, 2024, the ED has amended their first half of April reprocessing timeline on tax discrepancies. The ED announced that they are now aiming to reprocess all tax affected FAFSA applications by May 1. The ED clarified that they expect to reprocess FAFSAs with other known issues by next week, so the extended May 1 timeline is specific to the tax discrepancies. If your FAFSA has been processed again, you will receive notification via email from the ED.

As of April 4, 2024, the ED announced all FAFSA applications impacted by tax discrepancies will be corrected and reprocessed when the functionality is available in the first half of April. If your FAFSA has been processed again in April, you will receive notification via email from the ED.

As of April 1, 2024, the ED announced that roughly 20% of all FAFSA applications are affected by one of the following issues:

• Some data fields are pulled from a mix of updated and original returns leading to inconsistent tax data.
• Educational tax credit data field is inaccurate.
• For manually entered tax information, inaccurate reported values for education tax credits and income taxes paid, due to discrepancies in the instructions.

To prepare for the 2024-2025 FAFSA, you can:

Verify FSA ID(s)

An FSA ID is an account and password that gives you access to the Federal Student Aid’s online system and serves as your electronic signature. FSA IDs can take a few days to be created and verified, so having yours ready in advance will allow you to complete the FAFSA as soon as it opens.

Confirm your existing FSA ID and email address, or create an FSA ID on the Federal Student Aid website, and assist contributors, such as your parent(s) or spouse, in creating an FSA ID. Be sure to opt in to SMS message alerts to receive up to date notifications and learn about upcoming changes to the FAFSA.

With the FSA ID, you can fill out the FAFSA when it’s available (by Dec. 31) and sign your Master Promissory Note (MPN), if applicable.

Estimate Aid

Before the FAFSA opens in December, you can use the Federal Student Aid Estimator tool to find out how much federal student aid you may be eligible for in the 2024–2025 award year. 

This tool estimates the Student Aid Index (SAI) for 2024–25 award year, not the Expected Family Contribution (EFC) for 2023–24 award year.

Complete the FAFSA

Complete the FAFSA as soon as it opens (by Dec. 31).

Instead of opening in October, the 2024-2025 FAFSA will open in December 2023. This change is temporary. After the 2024-2025 aid year, the FAFSA will be available in October as usual.

For a preview of the updated FAFSA, check out Federal Student Aid's October 2023 Financial Aid Bootcamps:

• Dependent Student FAFSA Prototype Preview
• Independent Student FAFSA Prototype Preview

The U.S. Department of Education anticipates it will start sending FAFSA data to institutions at the end of January 2024.

The FAFSA will have fewer questions and fewer requirements. It will retrieve tax information using a direct data exchange from the IRS instead of the previous IRS Data Retrieval Tool.

The FAFSA is introducing new terminology, including:

Contributor

A contributor is anyone who is required to provide information on a student’s FAFSA form, including the student, the student’s spouse, a biological or adopted parent, or the parent’s spouse.

• Being a contributor does not imply responsibility for the student's college costs.
• Students will need the contributor’s name, date of birth, Social Security Number, and email address to invite them to complete the required portion of the FAFSA.
• All contributors—student, student's spouse (if married) and student's parent(s) (if a dependent student)—must provide consent to have tax data transferred directly from the IRS to the FAFSA. If consent is not provided by all parties, the student will not be eligible for federal financial aid. In previous years, transferring IRS data was optional. It is now required. In addition, small businesses and family farms are now considered assets. 
• If you are a dependent student, you will report your parents' information and your own. If your parents are divorced or separated, the contributing parent(s) is the parent (and their spouse, if remarried) who provided the greater portion of your financial support during the 12 months immediately prior to filing the FAFSA. It is not automatically the parent you primarily lived with during the past 12 months.

Student Aid Index

The need analysis formula to determine financial aid, formerly known as the Expected Family Contribution (EFC), will now be the Student Aid Index (SAI). Unlike the EFC, the SAI may be a negative number. The maximum EFC was zero.

The number of family members in college will still be asked on the FAFSA, but it will be excluded from the federal, state, and institutional financial aid calculation.

Students may qualify for a maximum Pell Grant based on family size, adjusted gross income (AGI), poverty guidelines and tax filing status. Students with a negative or 0 SAI are eligible for the maximum Pell Grant.

FAFSA Submission Summary

The Student Aid Report (SAR) will now be called the FAFSA Submission Summary. This is the summary submission document you receive after your FAFSA is processed by the Department of Education. You will receive an email when your FAFSA Submission Summary is available to view beginning in the first half of March.

The adjustments to the new Student Aid Index (SAI) calculation will expand Federal Pell Grant (nonrepayable aid) eligibility to more students.