As you all know, it’s currently “open season” for all students attending school in 2014-2015 to fill out their FAFSAs. Hopefully we can all agree that between assistance from FAFSA.gov and your local Financial Aid Office the actual act of completing the FAFSA isn’t too bad (if you do have problems call us or stop by our offices!). However, did you know that clicking “Submit” at the end of your FAFSA is NOT the end of the process?

After submitting your FAFSA you will be sent a Student Aid Report, or SAR for short, which is a paper or electronic document that gives you a basic summary of your financial aid eligibility as well as listings of your answers to the various FAFSA questions. If you submitted an email address on your FAFSA the SAR will be emailed to you. If you didn’t, it’ll be mailed to your permanent address.

So what should you do with this so called SAR? Well, we recommend that you review it very carefully to make sure everything is correct and complete. Just imagine not getting any grant money or Subsidized Stafford loans because you answered that you or your parents earned $300,000 in 2013 instead of $30,000…that would be pretty horrible, right?!? While we find and correct mistakes like that all the time, unfortunately we can’t catch and correct all of them! So read the SAR carefully and make sure there aren’t any errors or omissions!

If you do find a mistake or two you will want to correct or update your FAFSA pronto! If you encounter problems you can contact the FAFSA office via their website or contact us and we’ll be happy to help.

Remember, it’s YOUR financial aid… don’t let an oversight or a reporting mistake steal it from you!  Make sure it’s correct!