Update: I created my FSA ID last night and my son added me as a contributor this morning. Got the invitation email within 10 minutes! Already completed my section of the FAFSA. Much easier than I expected. Thanks everyone for the advice!

That's awesome Marina! Thanks for posting the update - it's really helpful to hear success stories with the new FAFSA system. For other parents reading this, Marina's experience shows that creating your FSA ID first and then having your student add you as a contributor really does work smoothly. The key seems to be making sure you use the same email address for both your FSA ID and when your student enters your info as a contributor. Good luck with the financial aid process!

Thanks everyone for the helpful responses! I feel much better knowing I should stick with my existing parent FSA ID. I'll make sure to answer the questions about multiple students in college carefully. I'm definitely going to look into getting specific advice about our situation through that Claimyr service too, since we have some complicated retirement account situations I want to make sure are handled correctly. Really appreciate all the advice!

Just wanted to add my experience as someone who went through this exact situation! I have twins who started college the same year, plus an older child who was already enrolled. The key thing that helped me was keeping a spreadsheet with each child's FSA ID, their school codes, and important deadlines since managing three FAFSAs can get overwhelming. Also, don't forget that some schools have earlier priority deadlines than the federal FAFSA deadline, so make sure you're tracking each college's specific requirements. The good news is once you get the system down with your first two kids, adding the third will feel much more manageable!

UPDATE: My daughter got her financial aid package even though we had the signature issue! The school used her SAI from the "in process" FAFSA and just made us promise to fix the signature as soon as we got the email. So don't panic too much - definitely call the schools!

Just wanted to add my experience as another data point - we had the exact same issue two weeks ago! The missing parent signature thing is happening to SO many families this year. We waited about 4 days and then got the email to complete the signature. The whole process took maybe 5 minutes once we could access it again. One thing that helped us was setting up email notifications in both our FSA ID accounts so we'd get alerts immediately. Also, I'd recommend taking screenshots of everything like Isabella mentioned - we documented the whole timeline just in case the school needed proof of when we submitted vs when we could actually complete it. The good news is that most schools are being really flexible about this since it's such a widespread technical issue. Don't stress too much - it sounds like you're on top of it and doing all the right things!

UPDATE: We got it working!! Thanks everyone for your help. What finally worked was a combination of things: 1. My daughter called her school's financial aid office who said they're giving extensions because so many people are having FAFSA issues 2. We cleared our browsers and used different devices (I used my phone, she used her laptop) 3. She sent a new invitation to me after double checking my info 4. The new email had a direct link that took me straight to the signature page SOLVED! If anyone else has this problem, try all these steps combined!

Great to see this got resolved! For anyone else dealing with similar FAFSA parent signature issues, I'd add one more tip that helped us last year: if you're still stuck after trying all these browser/device solutions, check if your parent FSA ID was created using a different variation of your name than what your daughter entered as the "contributor name" on her application. Even small differences like "Robert" vs "Bob" or including/excluding middle initials can cause the system to not recognize the connection. The FSA system is very literal about name matching. If that's the case, your daughter can edit the contributor information in her incomplete application to match your FSA ID exactly, then resend the invitation. Also seconding what others said about contacting financial aid offices - they're being super understanding about these technical issues this year!

This is exactly why I HATE the new FAFSA system!!! The old version was so much easier to navigate. My daughter nearly missed her university's priority deadline because of these exact issues. They redesigned everything to be "simpler" but actually made it MORE confusing! And don't even get me started on the SAI calculation changes... my older son got way more aid with the old EFC system than my daughter is getting with the new SAI scores. The whole thing is a mess.

Great to hear you got it resolved! That hidden arrow/dropdown issue seems to be a common problem with the new FAFSA interface. For future reference (and for others reading this), I've found that the FAFSA site works best in Chrome with all browser extensions disabled, and sometimes you need to refresh the page after completing each section to make sure all the navigation elements load properly. The user experience definitely needs improvement, but at least there are workarounds once you know what to look for!