<p>I was planning on enrolling at a pretty expensive private university this coming fall until I recently received an email from FAFSA informing me of a new EFC as a result of their verification process. Prior to receiving this email, I had a pretty generous financial aid package from my university. However, my EFC went from about $1900 to $15000 after their verification. How is this going to affect my financial aid award? My online statement says I'm expected to pay $50,031, but it seems like a glitch (it was at $18,000 prior to FAFSA's verification). I already sent out an email to the financial aid office, and I plan on calling the office on Tuesday. My family really can't afford $50,000 a year towards my education.<br>
Thank you.</p>
<p>I am not sure about what you say here. Your EFC after verification is $15,000, why your family has to pay $50,000 a year? I don't know about your family financial situation but $15,000 a year is very cheap. The cost to attend public state universities is a lot higher than that amount.</p>
<p>the university's online statement said I have to pay $50,031 for this coming years tuition. But I have a strong feeling this is a glitch because it just doesn't make sense. So you could actually just ignore this part. </p>
<p>FAFSA said my EFC is $15,000.</p>
<p>My question is why did my EFC jump from just $1900 to $15000 and how is this going to affect my financial aid award?</p>
<p>If this is one of the thousands of colleges that do not meet full need (or the few that promise but don't deliver), it's not hard to believe.
The verification process was likely completed after most scholarships and grants were given away; leaving the student with nothing but loans and a significant gap.</p>
<p>OP: Talk to FA immediately. And I hope you have a backup plan in case.</p>
<p>Sometimes families do not enter the data correctly onto the FAFSA and sometimes during verification FAFSA makes mistakes. OTOH...sometimes the new EFC computed by the FAFSA folks IS accurate. The only way to know is to do two things...you should have printed a copy of your old SAR (Student Aid Report) and you should be able to print out a copy of the new one. Compare them LINE BY LINE to see where the changes were made. Then check your tax returns to see if these changes were accurate.</p>
<p>THEN CALL THE FINAID DEPARTMENT AT YOUR COLLEGE. Ask them to verify your financial aid reward for next year, and if there is a change, ask why.</p>
<p>go to the online fafsa site and look at your new SAR and you might be able to see what they changed. That is a very large difference. Or call the school tomorrow and ask the FA office.</p>
<p>It is very difficult to wait until Monday to call FA when you get the info on a SAturday! This happened to us. Do print out the new SAR and compare it to the old one line by line. Compare it a few times! I missed the different line when our EFC was raised. If you did not make a copy of the original SAR, you will have to wait until Monday and call your FA office. One difference in the 2 EFC's is that you will no longer be eligible for the Federal need-based grants (Pell, etc.). I don't understand why with the original EFC, you were still having to pay 18,000. Did that include a bunch of loans, or mostly grants? Did you accept your original FA packet? It could be that since you were in the verification process, when the bill was generated by the school, they just charged for the whole amount. Does your school post your FA on-line? MY oldest D's school posts it on-line so you can see exactly what you are getting. This might be a help while you are waiting for Monday! Good luck!</p>
<p>It could also be a Prifile school, so when they ipdated FAFSA info and got a new FAFSA EFC, the Profile EFC was affected even more dramatically.</p>
<p>I would double check the SARS, people make mistakes- students and parents on the FAFSA, even finaid people can accidentally enter the wrong info, transpose a number, etc. So, the first thing is to make certain any decisions are based on accurate information.</p>
<p>Then have them explain the changes</p>
<p>I would guess that this is a Profile school, since the COA is over $50k. Even with a $15k EFC, there would be some financial aid offered (at least loans & work study). This is a really odd situation. If your EFC changed due to verification, you may have entered something incorrectly when filling out your original FAFSA. The financial aid administrator might have entered something incorrectly during the verification process (it is done by the school, not by the government). Either way, you will need to call the school's financial aid office to find out. Make sure that in addition to asking what caused the change in EFC, you ask about the fact that there is no aid at all awarded now. As I said earlier, that doesn't seem right ... unless you are an international student or for some other reason not eligible to receive aid.</p>