Posted Date:October 24, 2018
| Author: | Federal Student Aid |
Subject: Reprocessing and Voiding of a Small Population of 2018–2019 CPS Correction Transactions Planned After Resolution of Issue Involving Transfer of Incorrect Tax Year Data from IRS
We are informing all schools that we identified and fixed an issue that affected a small number of applicants who attempted to file a correction to their 2018–19 FAFSA between September 30, 2018 and October 4, 2018 and used the IRS Data Retrieval Tool (IRS DRT). This issue caused the transfer of 2017 tax year data to corrected transactions instead of the appropriate 2016 tax year data. This issue was resolved early on October 4, 2018.
The Central Processing System (CPS) will conduct a reprocessing on October 26, 2018 to update applicants impacted by this website issue. We will also send an email notification to impacted applicants explaining the reprocessing and necessary next steps.
See the sections below for more information on the issue and our reprocessing and email notification plans.
Issue Background
Applicants impacted by this issue submitted 2018–19 corrections on the fafsa.gov website and used the IRS DRT to transfer financial information between September 30, 2018 and October 4, 2018. These applicants received 2018–19 Student Aid Reports (SARs) listing their 2017 tax year financial data transferred to the corrected transaction by the IRS DRT instead of the appropriate 2016 tax year data.
Reprocessing and Email Notification Information
The CPS reprocessing on October 26, 2018 will address any 2018–19 records that transferred IRS data to a correction between September 30 and October 4, 2018. The reprocessed transactions are intended solely to alert impacted applicants that action is required; the CPS reprocessing will not modify the financial information transferred from the IRS.
Federal Student Aid (FSA) will also send an email to impacted students explaining the reprocessing and recommending that the applicant access the reprocessed transaction, transfer tax information again using the IRS DRT, make any other corrections needed originally when the issue occurred, and submit the correction for processing.
After reprocessing is complete, CPS will void all previous transactions that have the incorrect data for applicants impacted by this issue. This additional action will help ensure applicants do not submit corrections to earlier transactions which would result in the incorrect tax year information carrying forward to new transactions.
Several methods exist for schools to identify records resulting from the October 26 reprocessing:
- Reprocessed Institutional Student Information Records (ISIRs) will be sent under the IGSG19OP message class.
- SARs and ISIRs will include SAR comment code 172, which states “This SAR was produced because we processed a change to your information based on information reported to us by another agency or as a result of a processing system change. Review your SAR to see what effect, if any, this change has had on your application, and call 1-800-4-FED-AID (1-800-433-3243) if you have any questions.”
- ISIRs produced as a result of the reprocessing will include a value of “04” for the Reprocessed Reason Code (ISIR field #248).
- The FAA Information page in Student Inquiry on the FAA Access to CPS Online Web site will display “04 – Reprocessed for wrong tax year transferred from IRS DRT” for the Reprocessing Code for the transaction resulting from the reprocessing. The Reprocessing Reason Code 04 description will not display in FAA Access to CPS Online until after we implement updates to the site in a future release.
Contact Information
If you have questions regarding this message, contact CPS/SAIG Technical Support at 1-800-330-5947 (TDD/TTY 1-800-511-5806), or by e-mail at CPSSAIG@ed.gov.
If your students have questions regarding the 2018–2019 fafsa.gov website or results they receive from application or correction submissions, they should contact the Federal Student Aid Information Center at 1-800-4-FED-AID (1-800-433-3243) or by e-mail at FederalStudentAidCustomerService@ed.gov. TDD/TTY service is also available at 1-800-730-8913.
Financial Aid Administrators can also post questions to FSATECH. FSATECH is an electronic mailing list for technical questions about Federal Student Aid systems, software, and mainframe products. For more information on subscribing to FSATECH, go to: https://www2.ed.gov/offices/OSFAP/services/fsatechsubscribe.html