Okay, that clarifies.
The ‘little box’ thing was only added a few years ago, and about that time the DRT ‘went dark’ for fraud protection reasons so you can’t see the income on the FAFSA. It is a common mistake but I don’t think there is a way to correct it online, and not sure it is something FAFSA is even trying to correct because of the fraud issues.
@kelsmom may be able to inform us if one school can change it for all schools, and if the FAFSA has to be resubmitted to other schools after the correction is made by one school.
Looks like this was subject of discussion. It would be very nice if one FA Officer can change that FAFSA once and for all instead of having to go through the correction process with each school’s financial aid office.
I’d look to see if a change was made so it can be corrected by filer, but I don’t get a feeling it can. Then, approach the FA officers who are getting the report.
Update for you guys:
We called the FAFSA office twice today. The first time, we were told that we had to contact every college that we included on the list individually and provide proof so that they could make the correction- just like you guys said. I’m applying to eleven colleges, so we knew we had to get started pretty quickly. We sat down and contacted 2 colleges; both told us that they could not and would not make that change or look at any tax forms until after I was admitted, which makes complete sense.
But the last thing I want is to be in this tenuous situation until March, so we called FAFSA again. This time, a really helpful employee told us that this situation was unavoidable; there was no way we could have used the data retrieval tool and prevented the income inclusion without provided proof. So, she’s going to send us a paper form where we can include our tax and rollover information, sign it, and send it back so that they can make a correction. It’ll take a few weeks, but it’s much better than having to wait to contact all of my colleges.
Fingers crossed that this works, and thank you all for the help- we wouldn’t have figured this out without it.
Also, FYI, when the change is made you should get an email that tells you something was changed, but I don’t think it will tell you what or who made it.
I used to get those emails and I’d panic that the account was hacked or they were reducing aid, but it was usually the school updating the loan amount.
She should get a new SAR with the new EFC too right?
I’m glad that you are getting this fixed in one swoop, but the info you got is disturbing; that there is no way to avoid this when doing on line using the data retrieval when there is a qualified plan rollover.
Others are certainly going to run into this.
I’m guessing there is a misunderstanding unless something has changed. IIRC, one could use the DRT, but had to indicate the rollover when they submitted the FAFSA. This was so easy to miss!
In addition, the first year of the IRS DRT or so, there really was no way to indicate a rollover on the FAFSA when submitting. I believe this was corrected a couple of years ago adding that one little question or checked box or whatever to indicate the rollover.
And regardless…the person submitting the FAFSA could not correct this online.
I’m glad there is a way to get this changed at the FAFSA level by paper. I’ve never heard of this process before, so maybe that’s new this year too…either that or no one on here has ever used it.
I would keep in communication with my colleges if I were the OP. And especially if the student gets accepted to their top choice schools.
@brokenclocks first thank you for asking this question- as well as thank you to all that answered. Our EFC was overstated too re rollover, but @brokenclocks I would highly suggest calling each of the schools that your student applied to because some schools allocate grants and scholarships based on your EFC.
Most will have you send a copy of your 2018 tax return (May need you to indicate rollover and initial), some want documentation of redeposit too, some require a letter stating it’s rollover and they will adjust.
I have stated “some” because I have called 6 schools this morning and they all have different requests.
At each school I contacted the Admissions dept first, they all transferred me to the correct dept in financial aid, most schools were very knowledgeable of how to correct error. One school I will call back to get a different person on the phone.
My son’s FAFSA also included a rollover. I was able to contact one college’s financial aid office and they corrected the FAFSA which was updated at all of the colleges so I did not have to call each college individually.
I am pretty sure you cannot actually enter the actual numbers. As I recall, the question about rollovers exists simply to notify the aid office that they may want to follow up (when they are able). I think that FSA was asked at last year’s training why the information could not be entered as part of the FAFSA process, and they said it was not possible to incorporate the rollover information. They felt that in the scheme of things, not being able to do this would affect relatively few students eligible for need based federal aid. The solution is still to contact each school & ask each what they need.
I would be shocked if FSA actually will change it on their end based on the paper correction. If they do, please post to let us know that they did it. That is a new one that I have not heard, and I find it unusual.
Here is some info, there should have been a question on the FAFSA to ask about this
https://studentaid.ed.gov/sa/1920/help/student-untaxed-ira-distributions
The problem is that the FAFSA DRT process copies over the entries from the tax return, and not taking into account that the amount of the IRA distribution might not be taxable (rollover).
The 1099-R should indicate that it was a rollover, so the colleges will probably need a copy of that, to make the correction, if you missed the question on the FAFSA.
If the answer is prefilled by the IRS during the DRT, it will result in the incorrect EFC like OP got. Only a manual tax input would keep that from happening. It’s a bad glitch, but one FSA has decided to let stand for the time being.
Right…the question IS on the FAFSA, but the student/parent needs to answer it…but more important…check that little box which is teeny and easily overlooked.
The good news is that this can be corrected by the college financial aid offices. So give at least one a call.
The bad news is that the FAFSA should be a LOT more clear on this!!
Hello all, sorry for the late update. We received the paper forms to correct the rollover information in our mail about two weeks after calling FAFSA. After sending it back, our EFC was changed in about a week. It went from 63000 to 25000 :). So yes, paper corrections are possible, though many FAFSA reps denied it until our last call.