Does anyone know if it will be required to use 2015 financial information for the 2017-18 Fafsa by the new rules or will I still be able to use my 2016 financial information if my financial situation has changed?
The 2017/2018 FAFSA will use 2015 tax year information…from that 2015 tax return.
You would have to contact the college direct,y to see if and how they would make adjustments for changed circumstances in 2016. The 2016 tax year will be used for the 2018-2019 FAFSA.
If everything is as they have proposed, the FAFSA submission for 2017-2018 will be opened this October. Then, they would have to use 2015 tax info as 2016 is not completed by that time.
i thought they were going to use two years’ worth of information. So you can estimate your 2016 info then submit a correction in February 2017 with your actual 2016 information.
@brantly that is not my understanding. My understanding is that beginning with the 2017-2018 FAFSA. The prior prior year…in this case 2015…will be used for FAFSA filing purposes.
The 2016 tax year will be used for the 2018-2019 FAFSA.
@kelsmom am I correct?
No, they are going to use 2015 information two years in a row.
No, you won’t use 2016 information until the 2018-2019 FAFSA (October 2017 at the earliest).
OK. I stand corrected. I thought they were going to use two years of info. But I suppose that if someone lost a job or had a serious financial setback that would not be reflected in the 2015 income, they can provide a narrative about that with back-up documents. Can they?
@brantly if there is a significant change from 2015 to 2016, the family will need to deal,with the college directly and ask for a special circumstances consideration. There isn’t anyplace on the FAFSA to indicate changes from year to year.
Some schools will do special circumstances considerations, and some won’t. And they are all handled on a case by case basis.
It will be interesting to see how this plays out.
You can provide anything you want. Whether or not the school takes it into consideration is a different matter. I suspect the answer is, “it depends…”
For the FAFSA application itself, it is not possible to provide a narrative or back up documentation. You have to fill it out with the information it asks for (2015 tax information), not what you think it should be. What you can do is file an appeal directly with the college after the FAFSA is processed. The FA officer can use professional judgment to make any adjustments to federal aid.
Yes, that’s kind of what I meant. Just a process to elucidate your situation. Thanks for making it clear.
^ For that, it is still the same as before as no one can predict the financial situation in the upcoming months regardless of the info entered is from last year or two years ago.
thanks everyone – I saw the phrase “may use 2015” in some places so was hoping it was optional.
^^Everything I read also said “can” and “may use 2015” and I too thought it was an option but not required. Alas, I think it was journalists using the ‘can’ and ‘may’ when the instructions are really ‘what is on your 2015 tax form line 7’?
I don’t think there will be an option to not use 2015, even if you don’t file 2017 FAFSA until after you do your 2016 taxes.
yes, that seems right – some googling only finds the may used by journalists, but not on the official website…thanks again.
I contacted my financial aid office (Virginia Commonwealth University) and they told me that 2016 income may be used for verification purposes… but that they aren’t sure. Anyone else have any thoughts on this?
I think the whole idea of the change is to make the financial aid package available earlier. If they need the 2016 tax info, then what is the point of this change. It does not make sense to simply give you an estimate earlier as it does no better than the NPC.
I completely agree with you… I am so confused. If we suddenly have to give them both tax returns, then things get messy and even more complicated.