FAFSA showing SAI of 8600 but stuck on 'pending' for both kids - no grants yet?

Welcome to the group! This is definitely a common situation right now. Having an SAI calculated is a good sign - it means the FAFSA has been processed by Federal Student Aid. With an SAI of $8,600, your children should be eligible for some Pell Grant funding, though not the maximum amount. The next step is for schools to receive this information. Sometimes there's a delay between when the SAI is calculated and when schools can access it. Each school has its own timeline for packaging financial aid awards after receiving FAFSA data. Some are quick (1-2 weeks) while others might take 4-8 weeks to send official aid offers. I'd recommend having your daughters contact each school's financial aid office directly to confirm they can see the FAFSA data. If the schools say they don't have the information yet, there might be a transmission issue worth investigating.

omg the same thing happened to my son!! his SAI was like 9000 something and we could see it on the website but it took FOREVER for the school to get it. turns out there was some glitch where it wasn't getting sent to the schools automatically. had to call fafsa directly and they fixed something on their end. then it showed up at his school like 3 days later. so annoying!!!!

I've dealt with this FAFSA nightmare for 3 kids now. The system is COMPLETELY BROKEN this year. An SAI of 8600 should qualify for some Pell Grant money, but not the maximum. The real problem is that the Dept of Education has had MAJOR issues with data transmission to schools. What's happening is that your application is technically processed (that's why you see the SAI), but something in their system is preventing it from being sent to schools. And of course they don't TELL you this is happening - they just leave you hanging while deadlines approach. And good luck getting any help from their customer service. I spent 6 HOURS on hold last month trying to fix my youngest's application!

if the sai is showing up in the account then your probably ok. my daughter had the same problem and we just had to wait. took about 2 months from when we submitted til she got her award letter. your sai is kinda in the middle so maybe some pell but not the full amount. their super backed up this year just be patient

I had this same issue with my FAFSA application getting stuck in limbo last month. After trying for weeks to get through on the Federal Student Aid hotline with no luck (always on hold or getting disconnected), I tried using Claimyr.com and it was a game-changer. It got me through to an actual FAFSA agent in about 20 minutes instead of waiting for hours. The agent confirmed there was a data transmission error on their end and manually pushed my FAFSA information to my schools. Within 3 days, my portal at each school updated and I started receiving aid packages the following week. They have a video demo of how it works here: https://youtu.be/TbC8dZQWYNQ Definitely worth it when you're up against deadlines and need to get issues resolved quickly.

Yes, they completely fixed it! The FAFSA agent I spoke with was able to see exactly what was happening with my application. There was some kind of flag on my account that was preventing the data from transmitting to my selected schools, even though it showed as "processed" on my end. The agent removed the flag and manually sent my information to all my schools. They also provided a case number so when I followed up with my schools a few days later, I could reference it. The financial aid offices confirmed they received everything shortly after my call. It definitely saved me from missing important deadlines.

Based on what you're describing, here's what's happening: The FAFSA has been processed by the Federal Student Aid office (that's why you can see the SAI), but there might be a delay in transmission to your daughters' selected schools. With an SAI of $8,600 for the 2025-2026 award year, your daughters should be eligible for some Pell Grant funding, though not the maximum amount. The current Pell Grant scale would likely give them approximately $1,500-$2,500 per year in Pell Grants, depending on the exact calculation and their enrollment status. Here are the steps I recommend: 1. Have your daughters log into their studentaid.gov accounts and verify which schools they listed on their FAFSAs 2. Contact each school's financial aid office directly (email often works better than phone) and ask if they've received the FAFSA data 3. If schools confirm they haven't received it, you'll need to contact Federal Student Aid directly to request a manual transmission 4. Document all communications in case you need to request deadline extensions from the schools For the deposit deadlines - many schools will allow you to put down a deposit with a pending financial aid application. Ask each school if they have a process for this situation, as it's quite common.

my nephew had this happen and it turned out his FAFSA was actually selected for verification!!! but they never sent him an email about it. he only found out when he called. you should definitely double check that's not what's going on with your kids applications. sometimes that can hold everything up for months if you don't submit the extra verification documents they need.

One thing to check that others haven't mentioned: make sure your daughters completed all steps of the FAFSA. Sometimes students think they've finished the application when they've actually only completed the student portion and not the parent/contributor section. The SAI wouldn't typically show up if this were the case, but it's worth verifying their applications show as "Processed" and not "Processing" or "Action Required." Another possibility is that they need to accept the terms for data transfer on studentaid.gov. Log in, go to the FAFSA form section, and check if there's any notification about needing to consent to information sharing with schools. Lastly, regarding deposits - I work in college admissions, and most schools have a process for financial aid pending situations. They may allow you to: 1. Submit a partial deposit 2. Request a deposit deadline extension 3. Make a refundable deposit pending aid packages Contact the admissions office (not just financial aid) to explain the situation and ask about these options.

Hi Sofia! Welcome to the community - you're definitely not alone in this situation! As a first-time college parent myself, I went through the exact same stress last year with my son. With an SAI of $8,600, your daughters should qualify for partial Pell Grants (probably around $1,500-$2,500 each as Miguel mentioned). The fact that you can see the SAI calculated is actually a great sign - it means the federal processing is complete. Here's what worked for us when we hit the same roadblock: I had my son email each school's financial aid office with his FAFSA confirmation number and asked them to confirm receipt of his data. Two schools had it, but one didn't - turns out there was a transmission glitch. The school that was missing it was able to request a manual send from Federal Student Aid. Also, don't panic about the deposit deadlines! Most schools are very understanding about FAFSA delays this year. When I explained our situation, three out of four schools automatically extended our deposit deadline by 30 days without us even asking. Keep us posted on how the school contacts go - fingers crossed everything gets sorted out quickly for your girls!