Summary: Upcoming Distribution of 2007-2008 Renewal FAFSA Reminders

Publication Date: January 19, 2007

Author: G. Kay Jacks, General Manager, Application, Operations and Delivery Services, Federal Student Aid

Summary: Upcoming Distribution of 2007-2008 Renewal FAFSA Reminders

Posted on 01-19-2007

Federal Student Aid would like to remind all schools that we will be sending 2007-2008 Renewal Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) reminder notifications to students from January 17, 2007 through February 16, 2007.

Students who are eligible to apply for aid using the Renewal FAFSA application for 2007-2008 and who qualify for reminders by January 12, 2007 will receive Renewal Reminder notifications. Please see the Renewal FAFSA Process Guide for a complete description of students eligible to file a Renewal FAFSA.

Note: Renewal-eligible students will be excluded from this distribution if they have filed a 2007-2008 FAFSA or Renewal FAFSA that has been processed by the Central Processing System (CPS) by January 17, 2007.

Based on feedback from the financial aid community, we are sending Renewal Reminders only one time in 2007-2008. Many of you indicated that sending the reminders closer to system start-up would be more effective for your students, rather than sending them once in November and again in February (as we did in 2006-2007). By eliminating the earlier distribution of Renewal Reminders, the Renewal FAFSA selection period has been extended by 11 weeks for 2007-2008, enabling as many eligible students as possible to receive Renewal Reminders and still meet important state deadlines in late February and early March.

We have also revised the Renewal Reminder e-mail and letter text for 2007-2008 to describe the renewal application process more clearly, to remind students that they can use the Renewal FAFSA to apply for aid from other sources (i.e., state and school), and to provide students with information about important state and school deadlines.

Renewal Reminder Eligibility

Corrections to 2006-2007 records to resolve any 2007-2008 renewal eligibility determination issues, such as resolving rejects or correcting e-mail or mailing addresses, must have been submitted by January 12, 2007 for students to receive the 2007-2008 Renewal Reminder.

In addition to being renewal-eligible, a student's 2006-2007 record must also have a "good" Social Security Number (SSN) match with the Social Security Administration (SSA) in order to receive a Renewal Reminder. A "good" SSN match occurs when the student's SSN, name, and date of birth all matched SSA's records, and the student received an SSN Match Flag of "4."

A successful SSN match result tells us that the student has previously been sent a Federal Student Aid PIN, which is required to access the student's Renewal FAFSA on the Web. Therefore, we use the SSN match results to determine if the student will be able to access Renewal FAFSA on the Web and should be sent a Renewal Reminder. If a student's SSN Match Flag is not "4," a Renewal Reminder is not sent because these students cannot access their Renewal FAFSA on the Web until they have a PIN. After these students request and receive PINs, they can access their Renewal FAFSAs on the Web.

Eligible students who provided e-mail addresses on their 2006-2007 records will receive 2007-2008 Renewal Reminder e-mails. Renewal-eligible students whose records do not have e-mail addresses with valid syntax, or whose Renewal Reminder e-mails are returned as undeliverable, will be mailed 2007-2008 Renewal Reminder letters, provided there is a deliverable mailing address.

Note: A student may become renewal-eligible for 2007-2008 after January 12, 2007 if he or she initially applies for 2006-2007 aid after January 12, or if a correction is made to his or her 2006-2007 record after January 12 that creates a renewal-eligible record. Such a student is eligible to complete the 2007-2008 Renewal FAFSA, but will not receive a Renewal Reminder e-mail or letter.

If You Have Questions

For further information on the 2007-2008 renewal application process, including samples of the Renewal Reminders and details regarding renewal application eligibility, see the 2007-2008 Renewal FAFSA Process Guide, which is available on the U.S. Department of Education's (ED's) Federal Student Aid Download (FSAdownload) Web site, located at http://www.fsadownload.ed.gov, and on ED's Information for Financial Aid Professionals (IFAP) Web site, located at http://www.ifap.ed.gov.

If you have any questions regarding the 2007-2008 renewal application process, contact CPS/SAIG Technical Support at 800/330-5947 (TDD/TTY 800/511-5806) or by e-mail at CPSSAIG@ed.gov.