Parent invitation email not showing FAFSA tasks - deleted and restarted but still nothing

same exact thing happened to me and my son! wasted like 2 weeks trying to figure it out. turns out he didnt actually designate me as a contributor correctly in the system. had him go back in and re-add me with the EXACT spelling of my name as it appears on my FSA ID.

This is a common issue with the new FAFSA. The problem could be one of several things: 1. Your niece might not have correctly designated her father as a contributor in her FAFSA portal. She needs to log in, go to "Manage Contributors" and make sure his name and email exactly match his FSA ID information. 2. Browser cache issues - have her father try logging in from a different browser or clear his cache completely before trying again. 3. There's a syncing delay between when she adds him and when he can see tasks. Sometimes it takes 24-48 hours for the system to fully update, even though the email goes out immediately. 4. If he created a new FSA ID just for this, it might not be fully processed yet. It can take up to 3 days for new IDs to fully activate in the system.

i had this happen too! the fix for me was SO STUPID. my daughter had to log back in, go to contributors section, REMOVE me completely, then add me back with a different email address (used my gmail instead of work email). got new invitation and boom everything worked. the system is so glitchy this year omg

When I had this EXACT problem with my son's FAFSA (so frustrating!!!), I spent HOURS calling the Federal Student Aid number and could NOT get through to anyone!!! Kept getting disconnected or put on hold forever. I finally used a service called Claimyr to get through to an actual FAFSA agent who fixed it in like 10 minutes. Turned out there was a mismatch between how my name was listed in the system versus how my son entered it. The agent fixed it on their end and I got a new email that actually worked! Check out their site claimyr.com or their video demo at https://youtu.be/TbC8dZQWYNQ - saved me so much stress when we were up against a deadline.

I work in a college financial aid office, and we're seeing this issue CONSTANTLY with the new FAFSA system. Beyond the suggestions others have mentioned, here are a few more technical fixes to try: 1. Check if your niece selected the correct parent relationship type. For example, if she selected "legal guardian" instead of "biological/adoptive parent," the system sometimes creates glitches. 2. Verify the parent's SSN was entered correctly in the student portion. Even a single digit being wrong can cause this exact issue. 3. If the parent has already filed taxes for 2023, make sure your niece indicated this correctly. If she marked "will file" when they've already filed, this creates a disconnect. 4. Delete ALL browser cookies and saved passwords before the parent tries logging in again. 5. Make sure the parent is going directly through the email link each time, not trying to access through studentaid.gov's main page.

Have you checked if there are any FAFSA system outages? Sometimes the system shows everything is fine on the student side but the contributor functionality is actually down. Go to https://studentaid.gov/help-center/maintenance to see if there are any known issues. Also, one weird fix that worked for me: have your niece log in, go to her FAFSA, and click on "View" rather than "Edit" her application. Sometimes you can see if the parent is properly linked there even when the email system is failing.

The entire FAFSA system is GARBAGE this year!!! My daughter and I tried EIGHT DIFFERENT TIMES to get the contributor part working. EIGHT!!!! The Department of Education should be ASHAMED of this disaster. We ended up having to go physically to her school's financial aid office where they had to call some special number to get it fixed. Apparently there's some kind of synchronization issue where if the parent already has an FSA ID from previous years, the new system doesn't connect it properly. TOTAL INCOMPETENCE!!

random question but did u check ur spam folder? my sons invitation went there and then when i found it and clicked it worked fine.

Just wanted to follow up on my earlier comment - did any of the suggestions work for you? I'm curious if you were able to resolve this issue. Several families I've been helping encountered similar problems, and I've found that in about 60% of cases, it's related to the parent's FSA ID not being fully validated in the system. If it's been more than 3 days since creating it, I'd definitely suggest calling FSA directly (or using that Claimyr service someone mentioned to skip the wait).