As of last week I have filled out the 2016/17 fafsa and applied at the community college I am interested in, but my finances are now drastically different than they were on the 2015 tax information (which was the only information I was allowed to provide). Due to dire medical issues our two person household went from 2 full time incomes in 2015 to a single disability payment for my husband; we now make less than $19,000 a year between the two of us. My own conditions will keep me from working for some time, and to fight the impact of how difficult these hardships have become I wanted to try to keep myself positive and moving forward, and so have been looking into going back to school. I have contacted the college available to me here and spoken to them both via email and phone about these income changes, but they say that I will not be able to update this information with them until March of 2017, which means it will be nearly a year before I will even know if I might be able to attend classes. I feel so frustrated and helpless at the situation because their lines of communication are very abrupt and closed, I keep feeling I may be able to make some progress though if I knew more about the situation, and the right questions to ask. Does anybody have any insight into what I may be able to do in these circumstances?
You do have to fill out the FAFSA answering the questions ask for the time period asked about (2015).
Once it processes, you can file an appeal with your school. There is often a form on the financial aid webpage and you fill it out and provide the documents required. In your case, they may ask for the letter of disability income, paycheck stubs showing year to date income for 2016, and w-2 and tax information from 2015.
They might say no, but you won’t know until you try.
Contact your school ASAP. They will tell you the process for dealing with this financial situation. You can call them and discuss the process before your FAFSA is processed by them.
Thank you for the suggestions! At this time they have told me that the only time I may file an appeal is in March. If you have any additional insight into how I might be able to change things earlier than this I would be very grateful. Thank you!
Are you applying for fall of 2017? It sounds like the school wants you to go through the standard procedure then do an appeal after you get a financial aid offer.
I was hoping to go fall '16, ideally.
I think your school might be confused and think you don’t want to go until fall 2017. If you can’t appeal until 2017, that would make sense to have to wait until March. Appeals for NOW should be considered now.
Look for the appeal form, print it out, gather the documents. My daughter appealed in April for the (then) current year. The FA office was confused and thought she was appealing for the next year (even though the documents CLEARLY said they were for the currently year!!). They asked daughter, she said “um, um, for next year? I don’t know” and they promptly shredded the documents I had spent time preparing. I was pretty mad. We (I) did them again and this time everyone was on the same page.
Because the 2017-18 FAFSA will also use 2015 tax documents and figures, keep everything. You’ll also have to appeal that FAFSA EFC as it will be basically the same as you submitted for this year.
I think it’s beginning to make sense, I will get in touch with them again. Thank you so much!
@twoinanddone’s story is a very important reminder…
Before giving any important piece of paper to a college bureaucracy, make a backup copy! This has saved our bacon a couple times dealing with community college.
^^ Yes, just assume the documents will be lost, shredded, misfiled, torn, or become a coaster for a coffee cup. Even when filed electronically, this school had trouble getting them to the right place. Turns out my daughter had two files, and they kept telling me they didn’t have her transcripts, updated ACT scores, other documents. Many were in the ‘second file.’ Um, one kid, one name, one SSN and they couldn’t figure it out?
In fact, the our Lovely Community College just sent dear daughter an email (paraphrasing) - “Form XYZ was filled out incorrectly. Because of the mistake, we could not accept it. Because it contained your personal information, we shredded it, so please don’t ask what the mistake was. Please come to our office and start over at your earliest convenience. Thank you.”
Can’t make this stuff up!
The ‘we shredded it’ for my forms (correctly filled out, no mistakes) was also due to the forms having PII on them. They cannot hold documents with PII, so if the can’t scan them immediately, they have to shred. A phone call to figure out what the forms were for? No, not happening. Shred first, ask questions later.
I think it’s important to find out whether a school will do PJ income adjustments. When the prior-prior year was first announced, some aid offices indicated that they would not do PJ income adjustments; they are not required to do so. Very short-staffed offices may opt to just use the PPY info, so do check.