<p>If she earns cash, she may be self-employed. Did she receive any statements (1099, or W-2) from her employer(s) last year?</p>
<p>No she did not. I’m not sure if she’s self-employed. She switches job a lot and only earns cash under employers. </p>
<p>Also, which CSS profile should I be filling out? Fall 2015 or Spring 2015? The Fall 2015 one says I’m filling out tax returns for 2014??? o.o I’m a hs senior this year. </p>
<p>When are you going to be starting college? I’ll assume you will graduate from HS next May or June and start college next fall so you want the fall 2015/spring 2016 profile. That one wants 2014 tax info. For now you provide estimated 2014 income information. The schools may or may not want updates in February when taxes are done for actual 2014 income numbers. You need to check each school’s finaid website to see if and how they want to receive updates. Some will simply update the profile income numbers from the fafsa you submit early next year.</p>
<p>Early in January file the fafsa with estimated 2014 income and actual asset info. Choose the ‘will file’ tax status option. Once taxes are done, update the fafsa with actual income info from the tax return and change the status to ‘have filed’. Your mom should plan on filing taxes very early next year. You too if you have a job and are required to file.</p>
<p>Fafsa doesn’t ask for employer, I don’t know about profile. The question is, does your mom report all of this cash income on her taxes? </p>
<p>Yes she reports all of her income on her taxes. So I am filling out the fall 2015 one but it asks for estimate for 2015 income? </p>
<p>Give the estimated number based on her 2013 tax if there is no significant difference between 2 years.</p>
<p>I know how to do it. But it asks for 2014 as the main information, but my mom only has 2013 as her latest. </p>
<p>The profile asks for a lot of information. Whether a particular school uses the info from a particular question varies. Some schools use the prior two years of financial info when awarding institutional aid. Some want an estimate for the year you will be in college. In any event, you have actual info for 2013, use it for questions that ask about 2013. If a question asks for 2014 or 2015 info it will have to be an estimate at this point. 2014 info will be updated with the actual info after the 1st of the year when taxes are filed. Each school will have it’s own procedures to make that update.</p>
<p>If she didn’t get a W-2 or 1099, and only receives cash, she’s self-employed. That’s OK. Lots of people are. Just be sure that you get all the pages from her tax return. It will not be as simple as the return for someone who was an employee.</p>
<p>@annoyingdad Well it doesn’t say that 2014 are estimates…it’s the actual thing. </p>
<p>That’s impossible at this point in time. No one can know the actual income numbers for 2014 until January at the earliest. When you apply early that’s the way it works. You should look at and listen to the interactive presentation that you can click on at the link below, especially slide 4 of the section How to Apply and Financial Documents Needed.</p>
<p><a href=“CSS Profile Home – CSS Profile | College Board”>College Board - SAT, AP, College Search and Admission Tools;
<p>Alright. So when it says 2014 income, it means 2013 tax returns right? </p>
<p>No, for 2014 income it means to estimate 2014 income. One way to do that is to use 2013 income if there’s no reasosn to expect much difference between 2013 and 2014. The 2013 returns would be the starting point for estimating 2014 income. </p>
<p>Since you say your mom’s earnings are in cash and she reports all of it on taxes and doesn’t get 1099s, she must keep track of what she earns as she earns it. Does she know how much she has earned so far in 2014? If she knows how much she has earned in the first 9 1/2 months of 2014, you can project how much she will have earned over the 12 months ending December 31st. If she typically earns less in November or December than the rest of the year you could adjust for that.</p>
<p>Well it looks like they’re asking for 2015 estimated income; 2013 and 2014 are not estimates…I’m doing the 2015-2016 form, is that right?</p>
<p>Also,I know when I submit the form I’ll get fee waivers depending on the income but if I add a few colleges later, will I lose that fee waiver? </p>
<p>The 2015-2016 FAFSA/Profile ask for 2014 income. Parents typically do not file their 2014 income taxes until Feb-March of 2015 - this is why you are currently being asked for estimates, since your parent won’t have their taxes completed until early next year. </p>
<p>Did you look at and listen to the collegeboard interactive presentation slide I mentioned above. It says if you are filling out the profile and don’t have the current years taxes done yet, which you don’t for 2014, estimate to the best of your ability. There’s nothing more that can be said about that if you’re not believing us or the collegeboard website.</p>
<p>Yes, you’re doing the correct profile. I don’t know anything about fee waivers.</p>
<p>I believe you need to ask your high school counselor about fee waivers.
Are you on FRL?</p>
<p>Ok so it asks for 2013, 2014 and 2015. 2014 and 2015 and estimates??? But 2014 has so much to fill…and it says current year…I feel like something is wrong. </p>
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<p>It’s almost the end of October. You should have a pretty good idea what your numbers are for 2014 based on your current tax stub, and year to date information. But because you will be extrapolating the remaining time, and have not completed your taxes, you are estimating. But estimate very well…because the 2014 numbers are the ones that your aid will be based on for the. 2015-2016 academic year. 2014 is the current year for financial aid purposes …it’s the income year on which the 2015-2016 need based aid will be based.</p>
<p>For 2015, they are asking for an estimate. If you think your income will be about the same…put that number. It’s an estimate. </p>
<p>2013 numbers are actual numbers that should not be estimates. Get out your tax return for last year.</p>
<p>But for 2014, it asks me for all the information and it tells me to find them in the lines of the tax return when I don’t have the tax return??? </p>