<p>I'm so irritated with the financial aid process right now. I legally changed my name last year, well before I filed my FAFSA. I changed the name with my college last year. I specifically asked if I had to do anything related to my financial aid and was told that I didn't, it would all be taken care of. I did my taxes and submitted my FAFSA in January and I am still waiting on Financial aid. It turns out that there was more for me to do. My NSLDS account still had the old name, so my FAFSA didn't match my NSLDS account. </p>
<p>I've spent the last five months trying to fix this. I had to send documents to the holders of my loans and wait for them to update my NSLDS account. So, they finally did that a month ago. I called my school to find out what was next and was told that I just had to wait and my FAFSA would "catch up." So I waited a couple of weeks and it never caught up. I called the department of education and was told that the school had put the block code on my account and they had to remove it.</p>
<p>So, yesterday I called the school back. The student worker had no idea what I was talking about and kept doing this back and forth with a loan officer. I don't know why she wouldn't just let me talk to the loan officer directly. At the end of the conversation she said the loan officer went into my account and changed it. Well, I checked my account today and guess what? Nothing has changed. Another NSLDS mismatch was issued by my school yesterday AFTER I had called.</p>
<p>Word to the wise, if you get married, get adopted, or whatever, and your name changes you have to send documents to your lenders and DO NOT submit your FAFSA until your lenders have updated your NSLDS account.</p>
<p>Oh and here is the kicker. When I asked about my scholarships I found out that have already distributed them and since I did not receive any messages from financial aid it means my $5000 scholarship was not renewed. The only reason that would happen is because my financial aid file wasn't complete by the deadline.</p>
<p>If you had done everything required for the scholarship to be renewed & the ONLY thing that kept you from getting them renewed was the issue with your name, I would suggest asking to speak with a manager in the financial aid office. If you did not comply with requests made by the office, you will probably be out of luck - but if you did & the hold-up was solely the name problem, you may get some help with the scholarship.</p>
<p>Name changes can be a really big problem. Usually, a name change goes smoothly. Once in awhile, though, everything gets messed up & it’s really hard to fix. Try talking to a manager, if possible, to get this straightened out.</p>
<p>The only name check that is performed with the FAFSA is with name, social and date of birth between FAFSA and the Social Security Adminstration. If your name is still being flagged a wrong, you definately need to check with the SSA Office to make sure they have updated your social security records.</p>
<p>Direct loans use the COD identifier, and name changes can sometimes be a problem when the COD identifier is in the old last name. </p>
<p>And as NikkiiL says, you should definitely check with the SSA Office to make sure they have the correct name on file (I imagine the FAFSA would have rejected if the name didn’t match, though).</p>
<p>Nikkii, the problem is a mismatch between the name on my FAFSA and the name on my NSLDS account, which is where my student loan records are. I’ve since gone through all the hoops to get my NSLDS account updated, but for some reason I can’t seem to get the mismatch removed from my financial aid file. I think this is what they pull to make sure I am eligible to borrow (haven’t exceeded any maxes and don’t have any defaults, etc).</p>
<p>I know for a fact my name is correct on my social security record because I took care of all that stuff last year and have a new SS card.</p>
<p>I’ve been in contact with my FA office regularly since the beginning of the year. My NSLDS account was corrected over a month ago, before the scholarship deadline. I’m going to call the FA office again tomorrow and maybe I can get them to let me talk to s loan officer directly. Or maybe I will just go in in person during drop-in hours (I’m reluctant to do that because of the 70 mile drive involved, but I may have no choice).</p>
<p>After getting yet another letter issued about the NSLDS mismatch I called again and we agreed I should go in and talk to a FA rep. So that is what I am doing today.</p>
<p>Do you have this resolved? Any advice? I am in the exact same boat, and it’s unsettling… </p>
<p>my school tells me directly loan is holding up the show, and direct loan is telling me my school is holding up the show. It’s like no one cares!</p>
<p>Direct Loans uses a COD identifier to link your name to the name in the government system used by DL. I have fixed COD identifier issues, and some are harder to fix than others. When names don’t link up, it’s not easy to fix. Be persistent, though - there is a ton to do in a financial aid office this time of year, so your issue might be put aside in order to take care of something else. You don’t want to fall through the cracks. See if you can get the name/email address of the person who is working on your issue & keep in contact.</p>
<p>Also, make sure to check with your professors and make sure that your correct name is showing on the rosters. When I married – and submitted all the info to the registrar’s office as specified – it turned out that they did not actually process the name change, and rosters and grade reports for the subsequent semester listed my maiden name. Some of the faculty knew me well enough already to just put the grades under the former name, but two of my professors didn’t know that and gave F’s to that student who never showed up or took any exams. It was a mess to clean up because grade changes (which is what this looked like from a transcript perspective) required approval up through the Vice Chancellor level. (But F to A made it worthwhile.)</p>