FSA says my name on my FSAID doesn’t match my name at SSA. It does. FSA won’t tell me what doesn’t match, or how to fix it. All the info I can access at FSAID shows the same name as is currently on my SS card (with the exception that FSA only uses middle initial).
(to answer inevitable questions: This is my personal FSAID and my personal FAFSA. I am a parent and a student. I do not qualify for FA, but I need a FAFSA on file to be eligible for merit awards.)
Previously, I took advice I was given here and went to FA at my school, with the appropriate documents to prove I’m me, SS card, etc, etc. They did something and told me it was taken care of. I wasn’t getting aid at the time so nothing happened anyway.
Now I should be filing a new FAFSA, but I can’t because I am still locked out due to the FSAID issue.
I have not yet, as I wasn’t sure what they could do for me this time that they didn’t do last time?
Maybe I’m not understanding the process well enough. I can take them all the same information I took them last time, and they can check it again against the same information that was in their system the last time?
The SSA is not good at records. Yes, I’m serious. They often fail to change a name even when you’ve gone down there to change it, even if you’ve been using it for 10 years. It might be a bad space in your last name, a birth date. Who knows.
I re-read your old post, and it looks like you never got the FSA ID last year, your school just overrode the system, so it’s the same problem this year. Something in the SSA system isn’t matching what you are putting into FAFSA. I think it might be your birth date or your SSN (it is **** out on FAFSA, so you have to be very careful.
I once had a really perplexing issue with a student & SSN not matching up. She finally went to the SSA office and got a print out of her SSA information. In reviewing it, we realized it had to do with how her name was showing up in terms of first/last. If you are near an SSA office, it might pay to invest some time standing in line there to talk to someone. Once the student updated her FAFSA with the name as it appears in SSA records, the issue was resolved. (Of course, then there were some computer-matching issues on the school side - but that was easier to deal with than the other mismatch, because we had control over how to correct it on our end.)
Hadn’t had a chance to follow @thumper1 advice and go to FA yet, because classes off-campus.
Curiosity was piqued by @twoinanddone and @kelsmom comments. Went and switched my name on the FSAID to my old name… and it successfully verified against SSA. So, despite my name being right at SSA.gov (I checked) and right on my SS card, its somehow simultaneously still wrong at SSA.
I was thinking about you and wondered if you’d received a new SS card when you said you went to the SSA office last year. If ANY change is made, a new card is issued even if nothing on the card changes (although you said the card was right, it’s just the SSA records that are wrong so the clerk probably didn’t change anything). My daughter’s citizenship status changed, and she got a new card with exactly the same information on it (SSN and name), but when you change something the system issues a card.
The SSA seems to have more issues than most agencies in keeping the records right, and many of the inconsistencies seem to be discovered when it’s time to get a job or go to college. I know a lot of people who thought their (or more often their children’s) status had been updated but when they apply for financial aid it comes to light that the status was never changed.