FAFSA sign/submit error preventing me from completing application - took day off work!

Same thing happened to me last week!! The FAFSA site is garbage this year with all their "improvements." What fixed it for me was trying at exactly 6am - I think the servers are less busy then. But yeah the phone support is a complete joke. I waited 1.5 hrs and then got disconnected. 🤬

I work in financial aid at a community college, and we've been seeing a LOT of signature issues with the new FAFSA system. A few troubleshooting steps that have worked for students: 1. Try using a private/incognito browser window 2. Make sure you're not using any password manager auto-fill features 3. Check that both you and your daughter have verified email addresses on your FSA ID accounts 4. If you use any browser extensions or ad blockers, try disabling them If these don't work, your daughter's school financial aid office might be able to help verify if the FAFSA was partially submitted in the system even without signatures.

lol welcome to FAFSA hell. they make it impossible on purpose i swear. your best bet is probably just keep trying different times of day. the website works better at night usually. good luck!!

After trying to call the FSA helpline for DAYS about a similar issue (verification problems), I finally used this service called Claimyr that got me connected to an actual person at Federal Student Aid in like 10 minutes! Seriously saved me hours of frustration. I watched their demo first at https://youtu.be/TbC8dZQWYNQ and then went to claimyr.com. The agent was actually able to see exactly what was wrong with my application and fixed it while I was on the phone.

I dealt with this exact problem two days ago. The issue was that my daughter's FSA ID wasn't fully processed yet even though she could log in. The system needs 1-3 days to fully process new FSA IDs before they can be used for signing. Do you know if your daughter's FSA ID was created within the past few days? If so, that's almost certainly your problem. For next steps: 1. Double-check that both your FSA ID and your daughter's show as "verified" in the system 2. Try logging out completely and logging back in 3. If it's been less than 3 days since creating either FSA ID, you unfortunately may need to wait The new FAFSA system has all these timing issues that aren't clearly explained anywhere on their site.

You have to have the signatures to submit, unfortunately. The application won't be considered submitted until both signatures are completed. If your daughter's priority deadline is coming up, I recommend contacting the school's financial aid office directly. Many schools will grant extensions when there are documented FAFSA system issues (and trust me, they're WELL aware of all the problems this year).

For what its worth, my son's college accepted screenshots of the error messages as proof we were attempting to submit before the deadline. Then they gave us a 2 week extension. Most schools understand the FAFSA is a mess right now.

Update on my suggestion - I asked the Claimyr rep specifically about the signature issue when I called back about a different problem today. They said the FSA agents can actually see your application in their system even if it's partially completed, and they can help troubleshoot why the signatures aren't working. Might save you a trip to the financial aid office!

Glad you got answers! This whole new FAFSA system is such a disaster. My daughter almost missed out on $8000 in grants because of similar issues. They really need to extend all the deadlines this year.

I'm dealing with a similar signature issue right now and this thread has been so helpful! For anyone else reading this, I wanted to add that I discovered you can check your FSA ID verification status by logging into your account and looking at the "My Account" section - it will show if your identity verification is still "pending" or "complete." This saved me from wondering if that was my problem. Also, if you're still having browser issues, try Safari if you're on a Mac - it worked for me when Chrome and Firefox didn't. The FAFSA system really is a nightmare this year but at least we're all suffering together! 😅