The Department of Education announced on Tuesday that it will reprocess nearly 30 percent of Federal Application for Federal Student Aid forms and send them to schools no later than May 1.
The forms identified were “potentially affected” by processing errors stemming from incomplete tax information and calculation errors from students and the FAFSA processing system, the release states. The Education Department officials said they expect most reprocessed offers to reduce the amount of aid students are eligible to receive but that colleges can use the original records, should the applicant receive more financial aid based on the original records.
New first-year students must pay an enrollment deposit by May 1, according to the University bulletin website. The agency said in the release that they have identified and fixed the errors in their processing system and the data exchange process with the IRS, so new applications going forward should not experience the previously identified issues.
“We appreciate the extraordinary efforts being made by schools, vendors, states, and other partners during this difficult year,” Rich Cordray, the chief executive officer for the Federal Student Aid office, said in the release.
The FAFSA form — which this year reduced the amount of questions from 108 to as few as 18 for some applicants — was supposed to simplify the financial aid process, but delays in releasing the new form have led many universities to push back their enrollment deadlines. GW students who have completed the form had mixed feelings about the process, with some saying the application was just as lengthy as previous years despite the reduction in questions and others saying the new form simplified the process of applying for aid.
Incorrect tax information related to reported education tax credits and adjusted gross income from Internal Revenue Service records accounted for two-thirds of the affected records, according to the release. The rest of the forms impacted will require reprocessing to correct erroneous Student Aid Indexes — which determine the amount of financial aid a student could receive for dependent students with assets — which will be completed by April 15, the agency said in the release.
Education Department officials originally said that if an adjustment would reduce the amount of financial aid for an applicant, they would not reprocess the form unless asked to by the applicant’s university, but the agency reversed its decision April 4 citing “feedback from schools.”
