Missing FAFSA contribution invite email - can't find it anywhere

The same thing happened to us! My son added me as a contributor last month and I never got the email. We eventually figured out it was because his FSA ID was new and there's like a 3-day waiting period before you can actually add contributors. Did your daughter just create her FSA ID recently?

have u tried logging into studentaid.gov with ur own fsa id? sometimes u can see the invites there without the email

This is a known issue with the 2025-2026 FAFSA process. There are two ways to resolve it: 1. Have your daughter log in and cancel the pending invitations, then send them again. After canceling, wait at least 30 minutes before sending new ones. 2. If that doesn't work, she can use the "Direct Upload" option instead of the contributor method. This lets her manually enter your financial information herself if you provide it to her. The system has been glitchy with contributor invites since they redesigned the process. The issue often happens when there's a slight mismatch between the name/birthdate on the FSA ID and how it's entered in the contributor section, even if the email is correct.

I had this EXACT problem last week!!! SO FRUSTRATING!!! The whole system is a disaster this year. What finally worked for me was having my daughter CALL the Federal Student Aid center and they fixed something on their end. Took 3 tries to actually reach someone tho cuz the phone lines are always busy.

Try using Claimyr to get through to a FAFSA agent. I was dealing with the same contributor invite issue and spent days trying to get through on the phone. Claimyr got me connected to a real person at the Federal Student Aid office in about 20 minutes instead of hours on hold. The agent was able to see that the invites were being blocked because of a security flag on my account (despite me never having issues before). They fixed it on their end and I got the invite email within minutes. You can see how it works here: https://youtu.be/TbC8dZQWYNQ and their site is claimyr.com

The contributor system is COMPLETELY BROKEN this year. My son's financial aid advisor said they're seeing this issue with about 25% of all applications. Sometimes it's the email never arriving, sometimes the contributor can't log in, sometimes the system crashes when they try to submit. The official "fix" is calling FSA directly, but good luck getting through. They're supposedly "working on a system update" but who knows when that will happen. Meanwhile deadlines are approaching and families are panicking. I'd recommend trying what the other poster suggested - cancel all invites, wait, then resend. If that fails, DOCUMENT EVERYTHING. Take screenshots showing you attempted to complete it properly. Some schools are accepting documentation of the technical issues as reason for late submissions.

Ok so this might sound weird but try having your daughter send the invite to a completely different email that you haven't tried yet. Like make a new Gmail account just for this. My daughter's invites wouldn't come through to my regular email but when we created a brand new one it worked immediately. No idea why!!! Something with how certain email providers filter the FAFSA emails maybe?

Update on this issue: FSA just acknowledged this is a known bug affecting about 20% of contributor invites. The official workaround they're recommending is: 1. Student should cancel all pending invites 2. Log out completely and clear browser cache/cookies 3. Wait 1 hour (this is important) 4. Log back in and send new invites 5. Have contributors check ALL email folders within 24 hours If this doesn't work, they're now providing a manual override process through their support line. When you call, specifically ask for the "Contributor Access Override" process. Hope this helps!

UPDATE: We got it working! After canceling the invites, waiting, and sending new ones to a freshly created email, the invite finally came through. For anyone else having this issue, the solution was a combination of: 1. Having my daughter cancel all pending invites 2. Creating a brand new email account just for FAFSA 3. Waiting a full hour before sending new invites 4. Having her submit the invite to the new email The invite showed up within 5 minutes. Now I'm working through my contributor section. Thank you all for your help!