At least commiserating confirms that I am not "alone."
Maybe it was just because it was Friday ... and summer time, but I wasn't very confident in the CSRs at FAFSA the Federal Student Aid Information Center (FSAIC) where they answer FAFSA related questions.
The first one didn't know what I was talking about when I wanted to order the free pamphlet "Funding Education Beyond Highschool - The Guide to Federal Student Aid" for 2008-2009. I hate trying to read 58 page documents online and wanted a printed copy. I would have preferred to not print out 58 pages on my incredibly slow printer, but it is faster than trying to order it.
When I was trying to figure out how to answer the question about "household members" that addressed the parents' "other" children living at home, I was confused because of conflicting information I had read in various places.
The FAFSA guidelines seemed to be saying that I should count my 19 year old son who moved back in with us, even though we do not provide more than half of his support. FAFSA has an "or" clause in there that states that we would include him if he would answer "NO" to all of the questions that determined dependency status for FAFSA purposes. The rep told me that as long as we didn't claim him on our income tax and didn't provide more than half of his support, we wouldn't claim him as a household member for FAFSA purposes. I think he was wrong ... but what he was telling me matched what seemed to be conflicting information I had seen in various places on the internet. Maybe this is a new guideline, but if it is ... their reps need additional training.
As far as the Financial Aid office ... that was a bust as well. The only thing my daughter picked up for a Financial Aid packet was a single sheet flyer that directed us to web related resources (the school's as well as the governmental sites.) When I called to inquire about a more comprehensive printed packet and to ask additional questions, the individuals at both the school she currently attends and the school she will be attending were totally unfamiliar with the information on their own web-sites. Instead of having someone look into the inconsistent information I was running across that they provided in various places on their own sites, they referred me to FAFSA.
I spent most of the day on two schools' sites and on fafsa.ed.gov and studentaid.ed.gov as well as fafsa4caster.ed.gov and my mind is racing. I'm still trying to figure out where I ran across a "deadline" of June 30 and why the school's web-site says that the deadline for their processing FAFSA related applications is September 30 for Spring 2009. I'm going cross-eyed trying to keep everything straight.
Message Edited by Dawn on
06-14-2008 06:31 AM