Selected for FAFSA verification?

What to know

• Being selected is not an audit or an accusation — the U.S. Department of Education selects many students at random, plus some for specific data checks.
• Your financial aid (including Pell and many scholarships) is frozen until verification is complete, so finishing quickly protects your money.
• There is a deadline. Miss it and you can lose aid for the year — colleges set their own dates, often in the summer, so check yours.
• You do not pay anyone for this. Tax transcripts from the IRS and the verification process itself are always free.
• If your family’s situation changed (a job loss, lower income than the tax year shows), tell the aid office — that’s a separate appeal, and they can help.

What to do, in order

1. 1Don’t ignore it — and don’t panic. Verification is routine; much of it is random selection, not a red flag. But your aid is on hold until you finish, so act this week.
2. 2Find the exact list. Log in to your college’s student/financial-aid portal — that’s where the verification worksheet and the precise documents they need will be.
3. 3Use the IRS Data Retrieval Tool on the FAFSA to pull in tax info automatically — it’s the single best way to avoid errors and re-requests.
4. 4Fill out the worksheet completely and get every required signature (yours, and a parent’s if you’re a dependent). Missing signatures are the #1 cause of delays.
5. 5Submit through the portal the way they ask, by the deadline, and keep copies of everything you send.
6. 6Confirm they received it, then watch for a revised aid offer. Your numbers can change a little after verification — that’s normal.

Mistakes that cost students their aid

• Ignoring the notice because it looked like spam — check your student email and portal regularly after filing.
• Sending a plain printout of the tax return when the school requires an IRS Tax Return Transcript or the Data Retrieval Tool.
• Forgetting a parent signature on the worksheet (for dependent students).
• Missing the deadline — verification can take weeks, so start the moment you’re notified.

General guidance, not official advice — your college’s financial aid office sets the exact documents and deadline. When in doubt, call or email them; helping you finish verification is their job.