Publication Date: February 27, 2001
Author: General Manager: SFA Student Channel
Summary: Changes to 2001-2002 EFC Formula Worksheets
Posted on February 27, 2001
To: Financial Aid Community
From: Jennifer Douglas
Acting General Manager
Students Channel
Student Financial Assistance
Subject: Changes to 2001-2002 EFC Worksheets
On February 7, 2001, those in the financial aid community who receive e-mail listings of items posted to IFAP as part of the subscribe feature received a notification that the2001-2002 Expected Family Contribution (EFC) Worksheets were available. On February 13, we removed those worksheets from IFAP in order to make a correction relating to the automatic zero EFC criteria.
We also decided to make some additional changes to clarify procedures. We are now posting the revised 01-02 EFC Worksheets for everyone in the financial aid community, and we are explaining the changes below.
It is important to note that the only way of producing an official EFC is through the Central Processing System (CPS). Also, if an error changes the EFC, the rules for correcting the error are in the SFA Handbook (Student Eligibility Volume, pp. 1-205 to 1-207).
Correction
Automatic Zero EFC Criteria: In the original Introduction and Worksheets, we omitted the change for 2001-2002 that the student as well as the parent must have been eligible to file a 2000 IRS Form 1040A or 1040EZ. We now have added the appropriate references to "student" in the Introduction and in the footnotes for both regular and simplified Worksheet A. If the previous EFC worksheet was used to determine whether the student qualifies for an automatic zero EFC and the parents were eligible to file a 1040A or 1040EZ form, but the student wasn’t eligible, he or she would have incorrectly been designated to receive a zero EFC. This would be a rare situation.
Changes/Clarifications
The worksheets used to calculate EFCs for dependent students enrolled for other than nine months (Worksheet A, regular and simplified) did not reflect the improvements we made when we posted revised worksheets to IFAP on September 29, 2000. Our new worksheets now contain those improvements and are up-to-date for 01-02.
For those calculating EFCs for students enrolled other than nine months, we added footnotes to the "nine-month" worksheets instructing readers when to use the additional worksheets that follow. For example, for dependent students (Worksheet A), we indicate that for other-than-nine-month enrollment, one should use the worksheet on page 11 (or the worksheet on page 15, if one is using the simplified version). In addition, for independent students, we have clarified that other-than-nine-month worksheets are used only when calculating EFCs for students enrolled less than nine months. For independent students enrolled more than nine months, the standard nine-month EFC calculation amount is used. You will see that the B and C other-than-nine-month worksheets indicate the change to less than nine months. If the previous EFC worksheets were used to calculate an EFC for an independent student enrolled for more than nine months, then the prorated EFC would be greater than it should be, since the nine-month EFC is to be used for all independent students enrolled longer than nine months.
We have clarified that if Adjusted Gross Income is negative, one must enter zero on the worksheets. If the previous EFC worksheets were used with a student’s or parent's negative AGI when the student or parent had assets, then the negative AGI would reduce those assets and incorrectly reduce the EFC.
In the Introduction, we also clarified the options filers have for making corrections to their application data.
If you have questions about the EFC formula calculations, please contact the CPS Customer Service Call Center at (800) 330-5947 or send an email to: cps@ncs.com, or post a question through the SFA Tech List serve.