My college requires my non-custodial parent to complete a CSS Profile, too, and in the CSS webpage it gave me the option to email him so he can complete it himself. The problem is that he went to cssprofile.org and didn’t figure it out. When we finally met he showed me the email which led him to cssprofile.org but there’s no option to make a CSS Profile for a non-custodial parent. We tried together and made a college board account for him (despite the fact it didn’t give option to make a collegeboard account for parents, just for students or educators). Nevertheless, we went ahead and made a CSS Profile for 2018-19 but we figured we were in the wrong place when it did not let us continue without selecting a college to which he would attend… College board hasn’t gave any answer on their support email for css profiles and I really wonder if anyone faces the same problem as me and my dad, or maybe we are doing something wrong…
By the way the email said to go to cssprofile.org, make a college board account if he didn’t have one, and complete his application.
Yep. I had the same issue. I’m pretty sure my dad was able to resolve it by entering identical information as I entered on my CSS Profile, and the profiles were able to be linked that way.
It is NOT the website linked above, that doesn’t work. Just cssprofile.org and create an account (pretty sure my dad ended up signing up as a student), and creating a new profile on there.
Yea I will try that and my counselour is trying to figure it out too. If my conselour or me find a solution I’ll come back to share it.
I finally received answer from College Board.
Hope it helps you too:)
Emailed Steps:
Step 1: Go to Https://CSSProfile.collegeboard.org and click on sign in to apply.
Step 2: Click on sign in 2018-2019.
Step 3: You will be directed to a welcome page and will click on sign up.
Step 4: you will be taken to a page that says Create Your Student Account. In the general student information you will enter the student first and last name, the student gender and their date of birth.
Step 5: where it says Email address in the general student information you will enter your (the parent) email address and you will confirm the email address.
Step 6: After you enter your email address you will go to the next step and select the student High school graduation month and year, the student zip code and the student high school they attend/attended. You will skip the Filter by School Zip.
Step 7: In the username and password section you will create your own username and password and you will choose a security question from the drop down box then make an answer to your question you have picked.
Step 8: you will skip the Subscriptions and Parent Information section and you will click on “I agree with the Terms & Conditions.” And click next. The next page will ask you to confirm your information and then your account will be created. Please note when you are doing the application in the getting started-About the student section. you will see the noncustodial parent email address in the email section for that student, you will remove the email and enter the student email address.
You are awesome!! Thank you for sharing. We have been struggling with this for a few days. What an insanely inefficient process.
Wait. We are filling it out and nowhere does it say that it is the noncustodial form. It is identical to the regular CSS Profile.
Are you the noncustodial parent?
Yes. Essentially, we are helping SD and mom fill out the regular one and we would like to fill out ours.
Was anyone successful in completing this for 2018-19 year? We have emailed and called college board. They told us to complete that same process above - have one parent create a new account, etc. instead of using the non-custodial link. Once we create the new account and put in student and parent information, and then which parents are completing the form this time, it says that there is already an application on file (which is the other parent’s) and it does not let us continue to enter the 2nd parent’s info. Did anyone find a way to do this for this year? Thanks!
I’ve been chatting with a rep on this for like an hour. It is highly confusing and convoluted. In my case the non-custodial parent already had a collegeboard account since she herself is in school, so it’s even worse. She has to create another account (so she has to get a different email address to do it) jut for this.
Based on what the rep said, the NCP is filling out a “full” CSS PROFILE, not some special ncp form. Normally the PROFILE is filled out from the point-of-view of the student, but in this case it’s not - the very first page in the Application is “About the Student” - you still enter the student’s info… you then fill in your own info as one of the parents.
From what i can tell, this is the first year there is not a separate non custodial CSS form. Both sets of parents fill out the same form, BUT on about the 5th screen or so (after you’ve listed all parents) it asks who the kiddo lives with and who you are providing financial information for. If you click that kiddo lives with you, and you are providing financial info for you, that turns it into the custodial CSS. If you click the kiddo lives with other parent, and you are providing financial info for you, that turns it into the non-custodial CSS. I think that the rest of the screens are populated differently for the non-custodial parent, so you don’t have to provide all the same info that’s already been provided by the custodial parent. It probably primarily focuses on your finances.
Thanks guys. This has been a nightmare! We have talked to college board 4 times today. They told us to do all of these things to get the custodial and noncustodial accounts to “link up…” well, they won’t. We have done everything they told us to and we still can’t fill out the profile. IDK what to do, as some of these for early decision are supposed to be turned in very soon and the customer service is NO help. In fact, they left at 9 pm tonight and told us to hold on while they checked into our account some more…then they went home. I don’t even see an option to complete a paper form instead, so I am not sure what to do! Their computer system and customer service are awful!
NCParents pay heed: Do NOT use the non-custodial parent Profile link provided earlier in this post; you’ll short-circuit your process and end up a processing cyber-twilight hell. Instead, wait until you receive an email from Profile notifying you that your information is required and that you are to follow the link provided in the email to initiate a non-custodial parent Profile.
Also, if you can, ask your child to provide you with a copy of the first two pages of his/her Profile completed application PDF print-out. That way, you can enter in the exact identity-matching criteria that he/her entered (especially SSN, DOB, name spelling -e.g. has the child changed his/her last name in a situation which the remarried custodial parent has taken on the last name of his/her new spouse, etc.).
Anyone ever figure out how to complete the NCP profile?
Yes, Everyone follow @Politipotamus because what they suggested is extremely helpful and it solved the same problem. College Board needs to make this process easier. Thank you @Politipotamus!!!:
"NCParents pay heed: Do NOT use the non-custodial parent Profile link provided earlier in this post; you’ll short-circuit your process and end up a processing cyber-twilight hell. Instead, wait until you receive an email from Profile notifying you that your information is required and that you are to follow the link provided in the email to initiate a non-custodial parent Profile.
Also, if you can, ask your child to provide you with a copy of the first two pages of his/her Profile completed application PDF print-out. That way, you can enter in the exact identity-matching criteria that he/her entered (especially SSN, DOB, name spelling -e.g. has the child changed his/her last name in a situation which the remarried custodial parent has taken on the last name of his/her new spouse, etc.)."
Hi, I’m having the same problem. I followed the steps from @Politipotamus and what @ChrisG77 said about creating a “non-custodial parent profile” as with the custodial parent, with the only difference that when I was asked “Select the parent(s) whose information will be provided on this application” I changed the answer to the non custodial parent. My question is: Where/When do the two profiles get linked?
- I created my account (the non custodial parent) with my information, not the student one, does that matter?
I sure hope a LOT of folks complain to the College Board about this procedural change in completing the NCP Profile. I’ve never read so many complaints and issues getting I done.
It used to be pretty clear…it’s own NCP form.
Why did they change it?
“My question is: Where/When do the two profiles get linked?”
The linking takes place behind the scenes -as long as you provided the correct information (e.g. his/her exact name, DOB, residence, etc.) about your student so that it matches EXACTLY what he/she entered when he/she completed the Profile,
One way you can instantly confirm success is that CBFinAid ID number displayed to you after hitting the ‘Submit’ button should be an exact match to the one your student received. Also, you’ll get a notifying confirmation email containing the same CBFinAid ID number.
One thing I learned was that if you go back later and add a new school to the CSS/PROFILE, the NCP PROFILE seems to get sent automatically. There’s no notification, and the page makes it seem like the NCP will need to “do something”, but the 2 new schools now show it has “received” in their portals, and my ex didn’t do anything (because we couldn’t figure out what to do). Also means only the custodial parent has to pay a fee to submit it any new schools.