<p>We submitted the FAFSA for DD in mid January, then submitted a few corrections (to add schools and change from 'will file' to 'already filed'); we also submitted the PROFILE. She's received financial aid packages from a few schools so far, so I figured we were through the biggest part of the process, but yesterday we received an email that a college had modified the FAFSA and we need to make a correction so that it'll be considered finished again; the reason given was "You must provide asset information for you and your parent(s). Review Items 40 through 42 and Items 88 through 90..."</p>
<p>I looked at the old SAR's and it's true, those fields are blank, but as far as I can tell, these questions were skipped, both when we first submitted the FAFSA, and each time we made corrections. For example, we answered No to the question "On the day you submitted your FAFSA, did the total amount of your parents' current assets exceed $52,800.00?", and this caused 88, 89, 90 (below) to be skipped. </p>
<ol>
<li><p>On the day you submitted your FAFSA, what was your parents' total current balance of cash, savings, and checking accounts?</p></li>
<li><p>On the day you submitted your FAFSA, what was the net worth of your parents' investments, including real estate (not your parents' home)?</p></li>
<li><p>On the day you submitted your FAFSA, what was the net worth of your parents' current businesses and/or investment farms? </p></li>
</ol>
<p>It would be easy to answer these questions, but when we try to make a correction, those questions are still skipped - any advice?</p>
<p>This is related to the computer system the school is using. Most likely, they use Banner. There is an issue related to the skip logic and asset information that messes up the EFC calculation on the school side when any changes are made (including irrelevant changes such as changing the number of months in school, like when a student adds in summer classes). An estimated EFC results in the school’s system, and the computer will not allow aid to be disbursed. For this reason, some colleges are asking for the asset information to prevent possible future problems. The aid community thought they had an easier fix, but that one is up in the air right now due to conflicting information from ED on what is allowed.</p>
<p>Don’t worry about it - just submit the info. It’s more of a pain for the school than it is for you, believe it or not! :)</p>
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<p>Kelsmom…HOW does the OP submit this information when the questions do NOT appear on their FAFSA?</p>
<p>Oops — didn’t realize the college is asking the OP to make the correction. We are requiring families to complete our clarification of assets form. Mommapalooza, call the school. Maybe they don’t realize this is a problem yet!</p>
<p>Thanks for the information, much appreciated. I can contact the school, but need to figure out who made the correction (the FAFSA site just indicates “College” as the submitter); do I need to call FAFSA support or is there a way to figure it out from the site?</p>
<p>The email from FAFSA included the standard “the data will be made available to the school(s) listed on the student’s application”; do you happen to know, will all 4 schools listed on this college initiated correction now know about this, and if so, will I need to follow-up with them to explain? Or maybe it depends on how this ends up being resolved. DD is applying to more than 10 schools so not all her schools were listed there; hopefully the other schools won’t really be affected.</p>
<p>So much for thinking we were mostly through this process :)</p>
<p>What a conundrum (love that word!). It seems weird to me that the message was from FAFSA - I just skimmed the original post & assumed it was from the college. The thing is, the scenario I assumed doesn’t result in the assets being needed on the FAFSA end - they are only needed by the college. I am not quite sure why the change prompted your email from FAFSA. Usually only updates that change the formula from Auto 0 EFC or Simplified Needs will prompt a request for asset data from FAFSA (although I don’t actually recall any students ever receiving notification of the need for asset data from FAFSA - just from the schools). I am mystified. This obviously has something to do with the new skip logic, but it’s the first I have heard of this problem.</p>
<p>Yes, all schools listed on that transaction will receive the update (although some may not actually load the new transaction if they screen first). I would contact each school listed, and explain the situation. Ask them what they want you to do (if anything).</p>
<p>Another thought: Can you answer the question as Yes for the asset amount, even though your assets total less … then enter the actual amounts? That will let you enter them, and it won’t affect your EFC. I guess that is one way to satisfy the requirement.</p>
<p>Yeah, we considered answering Yes (to the less than 52,800 question), but I’m leery - it makes me nervous to indicate anywhere that we have more assets than we actually do although I know the following questions should clear it up. </p>
<p>I’ll try calling FAFSA to see if they’ll tell us who made the correction; if that doesn’t work, can try calling 3 of the 4 schools (1 of the 4 already sent their package so figuring it can’t be them).</p>
<p>hi mommapalooza, I also had that problem with the FAFSA. I called them and they just told me to answer “yes” in the asset question, and to answer the questions “skipped”. My EFC was the same after that, but in my FAFSA “estimate” (the page after submitting the FAFSA), I didn’t receive a Federal Pell Grant estimate (on the last corrections, I received one though).</p>
<p>Thanks Fromcalwithlove, glad you were able to get this corrected, especially your Pell eligibility. I called FAFSA yesterday and received different advice (but then the person didn’t seem to be very knowlegeable) - she identified the school which submitted the correction and thought I should contact them so I sent the school an email.</p>
<p>Strangely enough, the school turned out to be the one which has already sent DD a package; they do appear to use Banner so I guess it’s like kelsmom said, they’re just trying to avoid future problems by having our asset data on file, but for some reason they’re choosing to handle it this way instead of asking us for the information directly; maybe I can get them to accept it from me and cancel the correction. If not, will have to handle it as you described.</p>
<p>DD won’t be Pell eligible in any case, but we’re in that situation of realizing we may not be able to afford our EFC as it is and the idea of having that “Yes” answer in a database somewhere just makes all of us uncomfortable!</p>
<p>mommapalooza, glad you were able to find out which school, and good that you sent them an email asking what to do. Let us know what they tell you.</p>
<p>@mommapalooza, I’m glad my experience (which I didn’t really want to relive again because of the anxiety and stress of the FAFSA thing) helped in some way! 
Good luck to you and your D!</p>
<p>This was in the professional newletter this morning:</p>
<p>The Department has identified a correction issue in the Central Processing System (CPS) that causes Reject 1 (i.e., missing asset information on the FAFSA) to be incorrectly set in some cases. The error impacts applicants who answered “No” to the asset threshold screening question on the 2011-12 FAFSA on the Web application and, therefore, were allowed to skip asset questions. Roughly 2,600 applicants may have been impacted to date. The Department will implement a change in the CPS on Friday, March 18, 2011, that will prevent additional student records from encountering this error. This message provides schools with key details, background information, and next steps.</p>
<p>Maybe this is affecting you?</p>
<p>kelsmom, it definitely sounds related, if nothing else, perhaps there are multiple problems caused by the same skip logic change. Not sure what having “Reject 1” being incorrectly set would look like from the student side, so hard to say whether DD is one of the 2,600 affected; all of our FAFSA corrections processed successfully and we’ve received packages with need based aid from 3 schools so far, so it seemed like all was well for a while there.</p>
<p>Talked to a very nice FA person at the schoolwho said I was the second person they’d heard from today with this problem; it sounded like they were just coming up to speed about it. He confirmed they use Banner and thought maybe their system was automatically submitting the corrections. Anyway, he updated the fields (since he could access them even we couldn’t) and we’re back to having an EFC so I think we’re all set. Just another unexpected twist in the amazing FA journey :)</p>
<p>As Feb 12, we submit Fafsa. In the assets section I made a mistake, my mortgage is higher of what I filled up, the problem is that my assets looks that we own assets over 120,000, if I make the corrections family assets will drop to 80,000 whicj i guess is a big difference. The question is: How to do those corrections? Does all the Schools will get information in such corrections? (we listed 10 in the first stage then we erase 4 to add the rest of 14)… can somebody help me ? thanks…</p>
<p>First of all, when you say “my mortgage,” do you mean the mortgage on the home in which you live? If so, you should not report the value of your residence on the FAFSA. If it’s a rental home that you own, you do report the value (market value - outstanding amount of your mortgage) as an asset. Which is it for you?</p>
<p>Thanks a lot for your answer…well we as parents have a second property, a building that we are using as an office to provide management (properties maintenance services), is what we do… Yes, it was included as a second property with the commercial value of 120,000 and a commercial loan of $36k, but we have a second loan that we fail to report…our second mortgage is about $40k… the question is if it is important and worth it to modify or could be more risky to made any changes at this point?</p>
<p>If both loans are against the property, the $20,000 you over-reported may make some difference in your EFC. I say “may” because it depends on your asset threshold - I assume you must have had more than the threshold, though, if you reported an amount. It’s up to you … it’s a lot of work to correct that many FAFSAs. If you won’t be getting need based grants, it won’t matter. If you think you will get some need based grants, it could be worth it to contact the schools and ask them how they want you to correct it.</p>