Help! FAFSA messed up my financial aid package!

Paying for College
1

<p>So here's the deal. I submitted my completed FAFSA and thought everything would go smoothly. Wrong. I recently received a confirmation email from FAFSA and here's what part of it said:</p>

<p>You indicated you will file a 2013 tax return and provided estimated income information when you submitted your FAFSA. After you file your 2013 taxes, return to <a href="http://www.fafsa.gov"&gt;www.fafsa.gov&lt;/a> and update your income information to reflect the information on your tax return. You may be eligible to use the IRS Data Retrieval Tool to transfer your tax return information into the FAFSA.</p>

<p>No, I didn't say I would file a 2013 tax return on the FAFSA. I said I wasn't going to file. I even checked after my FAFSA was processed, and yes, I really did say I wasn't going to file! So now what? Who should I contact to fix this problem? </p>

2

<p>Take a deep breath … FAFSA didn’t mess up anything. What did you put for your parents? Does that say “will file?” </p>

<p>No matter what, the “will file” doesn’t hurt you.</p>

3

<p>OK, yes I did say my parents would file. So I guess that means when they do file I should go back and change that. I can do that, what a relief! Thanks!</p>

4

<p>Exactly. The easiest thing to do is to wait a couple weeks after your parents file, then use the IRS Data Retrieval Tool to import their tax info into the FAFSA. You will be given the choice to use the DRT when you check that they filed.</p>

5

<p>I did the manual update after I e-filed my tax return before DRT was available. I just re-do the update with the DRT and I was surprised with one information I overlooked. Now my EFC is much higher. Now it pretty much matches the IM calculation. To avoid trouble down the road, one should do DRT if it is available.</p>