To answer your follow-up question about income-contingent repayment for Parent PLUS loans: you would need to consolidate your PLUS loans into a Direct Consolidation Loan first. Then you could apply for Income-Contingent Repayment (ICR), which is the only income-driven plan available for Parent PLUS loans. Under ICR, your payment would be the lesser of: 1. 20% of your discretionary income (adjusted gross income minus 100% of poverty guideline) 2. What you would pay on a 12-year fixed payment plan, adjusted according to income Since your income varies, they would use your most recent tax return to calculate the initial payment, and you can request recalculation if your income changes significantly.

When you consolidate Parent PLUS loans, the new interest rate will be the weighted average of your original loans' rates, rounded up to the nearest 1/8th of a percent. So it's typically very close to what you were already paying. The term length can change based on the repayment plan you select, ranging from 10-30 years depending on loan balance and plan type. Consolidation does reset any progress toward forgiveness programs, but since Parent PLUS loans have limited forgiveness options anyway, this is less of a concern. One benefit: consolidation can give you access to ICR, which caps payments at 20% of discretionary income and offers forgiveness after 25 years of payments.

UPDATE: IT WORKED!!! I followed @practical_solution's advice - waited 24 hours, used incognito mode, and clicked submit again. The system showed a weird error message at first, but then refreshed to Stage 2! My son's status now shows "FAFSA Form Submitted" with today's date. No need to re-sign or re-enter anything. THANK YOU to everyone who responded with suggestions. For anyone else having this issue - definitely try the 24-hour reset method before starting over.

So glad to hear it worked for you! One more tip for future reference - take screenshots of your confirmation page and save the confirmation number. The new system has been known to occasionally revert statuses, and having proof of submission can save you headaches later.

when mine was down i just used the mobile app and it worked fine

my daughter had this problem last week and we missed her Cornell deadline bc of it. had to request an extension. they should really be more clear about when the site is down. btw anyone know if they really check parent's retirement accounts on the new FAFSA? i think i entered mine wrong

Just wanted to follow up - if you've checked all the technical suggestions and still can't resolve it, there's one more approach that sometimes works. Have your dad log into his FSA account, go to the "Messages" section, and look for any notification that might have been sent there but not to email. Sometimes the system delivers messages internally but fails to send the email notification. Also, if his account was created before 2022, there might be an issue with it not being fully compatible with the new system. In that case, he might need to update some information in his FSA profile.

hey did u ever fix this?? im having the same problem now with my dad

Also check if you accidentally entered income or assets in the wrong sections. My friend entered her parents' income as her own student income AND as parent income. Doubled everything and made their SAI crazy high!

After you review and correct any errors, remember to notify all the schools on your FAFSA list about the corrections. Sometimes they don't automatically get updated SAI information in a timely manner. A quick email to each financial aid office can ensure they're working with your current information.