FAFSA application stuck 'in review' since January - university needs SAI now

Same boat here. Submitted Jan 9th and just got our SAI last week. The new FAFSA system has major delays this year. Try emailing your daughter's university financial aid office and explain the situation - most schools are aware of the FAFSA delays and have contingency plans. They might be able to offer a preliminary aid package based on your estimated information while waiting for the official SAI.

omg the new fafsa is THE WORST!!! took us 6 weeks to get our sai and then it was wrong anyway bc they calculated our income wrong and now were in appeals 😫 honestly just email the school they already know its a mess

Financial aid counselor here. The FAFSA processing delays are affecting virtually everyone this year. The Department of Education has acknowledged significant backlogs with the new FAFSA system. Here's what I recommend: 1. Contact your daughter's university financial aid office directly, explain the situation, and ask for their preferred workaround. Many institutions are offering provisional aid packages based on prior-prior year tax information. 2. Ask the school if they can extend their May 1st enrollment deposit deadline given the FAFSA processing issues. Many schools are doing this. 3. If your daughter has been accepted to multiple institutions, communicate with all of them. Some may be more flexible than others. 4. Double-check your studentaid.gov account to ensure there are no pending action items or verification requests buried in the messages section. The good news is that schools are very aware of these issues and most have processes in place to accommodate delays.

My nephew had the same problem but with his dream school in California. They kept asking for the SAI number and the FAFSA was just sitting there for weeks on end. His mom had to drive to the school financial aid office in person to sort it out. Apparently some schools can do a manual calculation to estimate what your SAI will be based on your tax returns if you bring them in person. Might be worth asking about if your daughter's university is within driving distance.

I've been dealing with the same issue for my son's FAFSA. After weeks of failed attempts to reach someone at Federal Student Aid, I discovered a service called Claimyr (claimyr.com) that got me through to an actual human at FSA in about 20 minutes instead of being disconnected. They have a video showing how it works: https://youtu.be/TbC8dZQWYNQ The agent I spoke with confirmed our application was actually stuck due to a discrepancy between the name formatting on our tax return vs. how we entered it on FAFSA (I used my full middle name on one and just initial on the other). They fixed it right then and we got our SAI 3 days later. Might be worth checking if something similar is holding yours up.

THE WHOLE SYSTEM IS BROKEN!!! 🤬🤬🤬 My daughter's application has been "under review" since DECEMBER and her school is threatening to drop her from fall registration because they don't have her financial aid package finalized. I've called 37 TIMES and either get disconnected or wait 2+ hours to talk to someone who can't help. Department of Education KNEW they weren't ready to roll out the new system but did it anyway. Meanwhile our kids' futures hang in the balance. CRIMINAL INCOMPETENCE!!!

we sent ours in february and got the sai in like 3 weeks so maybe theres something wrong with your application? did you check if you have notifications in your fsaid account sometimes they need more info but dont email you

One other thing to check - log into studentaid.gov and look at your actual application. Sometimes there will be a status indicator next to specific sections that need attention. My daughter's got held up because even though the overall status just said "in review," when we clicked into the application detail page, there was a small warning symbol next to the parent information section that was easy to miss.

Following up on your latest discovery - yes, a truncated SSN could absolutely cause a processing delay. The system needs to match parent information with IRS records, and if the SSN isn't complete, it creates a verification issue. If you're able to correct that information in the application, do so immediately. After making the correction, I'd recommend using the contact solution someone mentioned above or trying the FSA email support option. Specifically mention that you identified and corrected an SSN display issue, as this might help prioritize your application review. In the meantime, still proceed with contacting your daughter's financial aid office to explore provisional aid options while waiting for the official SAI.