<p>I think it's ridiculous that every year I get "selected" for verification. </p>
<p>I know it's not random. They see my EFC is 0 and that my mother only has one incredibly low source of income and they get suspicious.</p>
<p>I just got accepted as a transfer student and while other transfers have received their packages, my application is still in progress.</p>
<p>It's such a pain to have to give them 4-5 supplemental documents each year to prove that I'm not lying. I'm going to be furious if verification causes me to get a lesser financial aid package because I filed all the forms they asked for on time. I've been told that doesn't happen, but how can it not if when so many grants and scholarships are being sent out to other students while my application is being "verified"?</p>
<p>They may well have already put together a tentative aid package for you, and just need to do the verification to finalize it. If they’ve told you not to worry about the aid being less than it otherwise would be, I’d take them on their word. Yours isn’t the first case like this they’ve dealt with.</p>
<p>We are verified every year too. I try not to think of it as a big pain in the butt, but rather as a (more than) reasonable exchange for the aid my kids get. The hours spent gathering and sending documents must work out to big-money-per-hour when I compare the aid to the time it takes to complete the apps and all the required documentation.</p>
<p>My son’s school wants the FAFSA, the CSS Profile, all tax documents, and has 3 of their own FA forms that have to be completed as well. Oh, plus another document that has to be verified by his sister’s college to prove he has a sib who’s also in college. Lots of paperwork! But still… well, well worth it.</p>
<p>You answered your own question – you get verified because of a 0 EFC. If you were on the other side of the game and wanted to make sure everyone was playing by the rules, you would look at the students who were sending up flags that maybe a story line was being “exaggerated.” In your case, it’s not – but they don’t know until they look. </p>
<p>It is tough times and expect more and more questions as time goes on. Best bet is to move through college briskly – and be NICE to the staff while checking in regularly to make sure all your paperwork is there and is complete. </p>
<p>There’s a Bible verse that goes “I cried because I had no shoes until I saw a man who had no feet.” If you are getting any aid, whatsoever, your life is blessed. You are getting an education – that plus some health and you have more than much of the world.</p>
<p>Wow, OP, how ungrateful. They are giving you big bucks so that you can get an education you couldn’t otherwise afford. And you are complaining about filing a few forms? I suggest you count your blessings.</p>
<p>Our DS was verified EVERY year for his undergrad years. Oddly, the only reason he completed a FAFSA was to get the Stafford loan. He didn’t qualify for any need based aid.</p>
<p>We just sent the “stuff” the college requested. It’s really no big deal to do so…we had everything we needed anyway.</p>
<p>Not something worth complaining about since the documents you need to submit for the verification are ones you needed to complete your FAFSA.</p>
<p>I wonder if you are verified the first year, if you are much more likely to be verified every year. My son has just been verified for his second year and our EFC is not 0, or anywhere close to 0.</p>
<p>At my DS’s school, automatic merit scholarship winners (based upon GPA and ACT/SAT scores) must complete the FAFSA even if they are not eligible or applying for need-based aid. We were selected for verification with an EFC of 99,999. I would not be surprised if some verifications were totally random and a good deal of others skewed or targeted to those claiming the highest need.</p>
<p>Some schools verify everyone or verify the same students every year. I got selected for verification all 4 years of college.</p>
<p>It’s not really that big of a deal. Since you already know it’s coming, file early and save all copies of your docs, and just submit them. I sighed and complained privately about it in undergrad too - I was always polite to the financial aid staff, even when they weren’t polite to me - but at the end of the day it involved submitting six documents (each of my parents’ W-2s and tax returns - they filed separately - and my own). In return, I was getting a full merit scholarship.</p>
<p>Also my last two years my mom decided to just not file her taxes until October of those years, which would not give me enough time to submit by March. So by being polite and talking to my FAO I got my verification requirements waived those years.</p>
Ok, I can (almost) see the need to fill out a FAFSA to get merit aid. Well - not really, especially if it is automatic. But it is what it is.</p>
<p>But if you accept no need-based aid, and especially no Federal aid, why would you get verified? What would be the point? Even if they find a problem, you are not getting any Federal money, so what difference does it make?</p>
<p>notrichenough - I agree entirely and have no idea selecting us for review would make any difference. When this happened last year (at least so far, they have not asked to verify 2010 tax data) I called the school to make sure there wasn’t a mistake.</p>
<p>Wow LasMa, what a petty snide comment you give in exchange for a legitimate question, how is one selected for verification.</p>
<p>Government programs providing services are not charity and inquiring the criteria used in the process is not being ungrateful. </p>
<p>If you think we shouldn’t have government programs for poor people LasMa, feel free to write your representative, or to petition your government to remove what scant protections there are for these // undeserved poor people when there are so many corporations in need of those tax dollars to further reduce their tax “burden” to more than they pay in taxes (i.e. they receive back more than they pay in taxes).</p>
<p>Wondering why some people are selected for verification repeatedly over others is a legitimate question, most of the money is not free either.</p>
<p>If you are worried about the government giving away money to people, maybe you should look beyond the lies of your politicians and look to the numbers, corporations pay negative income taxes.</p>
<p>It is legitimate to want to verify that information on the FAFSA is correct. If it didn’t happen, I can guarantee you that a LOT of people would lie … I saw plenty of lies when I verified files, and I believe there would be many more if there were no checks & balances. While it might be a pain to be verified, it is not a huge problem in the scheme of things.</p>
<p>It is always odd when people get selected for verification who are not going to get any federal grant aid … but the system checks will catch anyone who has an unusual combination of information. It could be an AGI/taxes paid combination that doesn’t fit the norm, or it could be a bigger family size than reported the previous year. It could be … well, a bunch of things. And if you think it is a pain to turn it all in to get a Pell, imagine how fun it is to turn it in just to get an unsub loan.</p>
<p>Getting selected once doesn’t increase your odds of getting selected again, other than from the standpoint that some combination of info prompts selection. I saw plenty of 0 income folks who were not selected … or who were selected one year & not the next (I worked at a school with a VERY low income student body).</p>
<p>I know it’s not random. They see my EFC is 0 and that my mother only has one incredibly low source of income and they get suspicious.</p>
<p>this may have been the trigger.</p>
<p>It’s only natural for a “red flag” to be raised if a parent is claiming a very low income. There’s going to be a question of how food is getting on the table, etc.</p>
<p>There was a kid last year who claimed that his family owned a pricey home (no mortgage), but only had an income of $8k per year (family of 4). It was just unbelievable that they could pay property taxes, utilities, and put food on the table with that income. He’ll probably get verified often, too. I don’t know if they were renting out bedrooms and not claiming the income or what. The whole thing didn’t pass the smell test.</p>
<p>Dreamingbig…at least you see a reason for being selected for verification. We were selected FOUR times and our kid didn’t get a PENNY of need based aid…not one penny. He had an unsubsidized Stafford loan…and a merit scholarship (that was NOT based on need…or EFC was in excess of the cost of attendance). Every year I wondered why they needed to verify a FAFSA that netted the student a subsidized stafford loan.</p>
<p>Well, as long as this thread has been resurected, I will report that DS’s school, Miami (OH), no longer requires that a FAFSA be filed for automatic scholarships. It’s still recommended at least for incoming freshmen.</p>
<p>When I was in college, I got selected most every year. My father is disabled and we therefore lived off his disability and pension. Though yes, I remember Verification being a pain, I think about the alternative and was okay with it. The alternative being people lying about everything on their information and being rewarded with more aid.
After graduation, I accepted a job processing verifications, and I can answer a lot of the questions raised so far. Your EFC does not select your for verification. If you have inconsistencies with previous applications or you make changes to your application, you could be selected. If you have an incredibly high EFC but it seems unrealistic, you could be selected. </p>