Approximately 30% of all students who complete a Free Application For Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) are selected by the federal processor for a process called VERIFICATION. In addition to the files selected by the federal processor, the Financial Aid Office may select a student’s file for the verification process in order to clear up discrepant information. Please note that in most cases, being selected for verification is simply a routine process, you are not being accused of providing fraudulent information.
You will receive a Student Aid Report from the federal processor once your FAFSA has been processed. It will be sent to you by mail or via email depending on the preferred method of contact you selected when you filed your FAFSA. If you were selected for the verification process by the federal processor, there will be a message on your Student Aid Report advising you that you were selected and to contact your Financial Aid Office for more information.
If you are not selected for the verification process, your file is considered complete as soon as your FAFSA data is received by the Financial Aid Office in a valid status. If your FASFA has been rejected by the federal processor, you will be required to resolve the issues. FAFSAs may be rejected for a number of reasons including, but not limited to the following: missing applicant or parent signatures; name and/or social security number mismatches; citizenship documentation issues; selective service registration issues. FAFSA rejections must be resolved before students are considered eligible for financial aid. The Financial Aid Office will request additional information from you to help resolve FAFSA rejects. It is essential that all requested documentation be submitted as quickly as possible. Failure to provide requested documentation in a timely manner could result in a loss of some forms of aid.
When a student’s file is selected for verification, the Financial Aid Office will compare federal tax data and information reported on a verification worksheet to the data submitted on the FAFSA. If all of the information matches, the file will be considered complete. If there are any discrepancies, the Financial Aid Office will electronically submit corrections to the federal processor. When the corrections are acknowledged by the federal processor, the student’s file will be considered complete.
STEP ONE
If you were selected for the verification process, please print, complete and return the appropriate Verification Worksheet from the list below.
STEP TWO
In addition to the worksheet, tax data must be provided from the Internal Revenue Service. Photocopies of federal tax returns are not acceptable to complete the verification process.
The easiest and most efficient way to provide tax data is to wait 2-3 weeks after you (and/or your parent's, if applicable) have filed your federal income tax return(s), and then log into your FAFSA, indicate that you want to submit a correction, and use the IRS Data Retrieval tool to link directly to the Internal Revenue Service database. Once the data has been uploaded to your FAFSA, do not change the data. If you feel there are special circumstances that render the IRS data invalid, please contact our office for further instructions. Please visit our IRS TAX DATA page for tips and tricks for completing data retrieval, including a tutorial video.
If you have waited until at least two weeks after you filed your federal tax return, and you are are not presented with the option to use IRS Data Retrieval in the FAFSA, you must request a tax return transcript of your (and your parent's or spouse's, if applicable) federal income tax return. You may request a transcript of your IRS tax return by either submitting a Tax Return Transcript Request at http://www.irs.gov or by calling the IRS at (800) 908-9946. If you, and/or your parents or spouse did not and will not file a federal tax return for the tax year in question, there is a place to indicate that on the verification form.
Occasionally we must request additional documentation from you after we receive your verification documents due to discrepancies that arise once your file is reviewed. We will notify you if any additional documentation is required. Again, it is important to submit all requested information as quickly as possible to prevent the loss of some forms of aid.
Please note that the Verification Forms below are aid year specific. If you are completing verification for the school year beginning August 26, 2013, please select the 2013-2014 forms. For Spring 2013 or Summer 2013, please select the 2012-13 forms.
