Bipartisan frustrations mount over FAFSA chaos as students wait on financial aid offers

For students and families applying for college financial aid, hang in there.

Major problems with the Free Application for Federal Student Aid, or FAFSA, means that universities and colleges will most likely be delayed in getting offer letters out.

With decision day just weeks away for some schools, the pressure is on to get applications processed.

On Wednesday, lawmakers held a hearing through the GOP-led House Subcommittee on Higher Education and Workforce Development.

“If there was a financial aid director or even a college president that delayed financial aid on their campus for up to six months, the professional price that would be paid for that would be pretty steep,” said Justin Draeger, head of the National Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators, while speaking on Capitol Hill.

The hearing came just a day after the Department of Education dropped a bombshell – that up to 40% of the FAFSA applications submitted so far this year could contain errors resulting from widespread application glitches or other issues.

Those forms are set to be reprocessed in coming weeks, and many will start being sent to schools by May 1, the agency said.

The federal government is normally able to get FAFSA information turned around within days but the delays this year have dragged the process out for months. Colleges and universities are behind schedule on getting award letters out due to the botched launch of the new FAFSA system.

Back in December, the Federal Student Aid office, which administers FAFSA, rolled out a new system. Changes included a simpler form that was supposed to streamline the federal financial aid application process for families. It also reduced the number of questions from over 100 to about 20, depending on the applicant.

However, problems have plagued the site since its launch on Dec. 30.

“It’s not a trivial task to roll this out, but this rollout has been disastrous and, frankly, inexcusable,” Rep. Brandon Williams, R-N.Y., said during Wednesday’s hearing.

Also on Wednesday, lawmakers sent a letter to the chief of General Dynamics, the military contractor that oversaw the FAFSA refresh under a nine-figure deal. They demanded more information on the project and accused the company of a “near-total failure” that they said is “harming millions of students and hundreds of colleges.”

General Dynamics didn’t immediately comment.

Agency leaders didn’t testify at the hearing, but a spokesperson said Tuesday that officials have identified and fixed errors in the online application system “affecting the accurate processing of large numbers of FAFSA forms.”

With that update on the errors being fixed, college readiness experts said most students and parents can get in and fill everything out before the deadlines.

Many colleges and universities are also now receiving those filled-out forms. Students could receive financial aid offers as early as this week or later this month. 

But again, with about 40 percent of forms submitted so far having errors, those students who are affected will have to wait until their form is fixed and the correction process could take up to a few weeks.

"We're hoping that the correction process will open very soon, within hopefully this week,” said Jill Desjean, Senior Policy Analyst at the National Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators. "[Institutions] are just scrambling right now to catch up and to start at least making financial aid offers for that 60% of students they can and they're waiting for the Department of Education about when they can go ahead and make the rest of those financial aid offers to students because they know students have been waiting a long time."

The backlog means many students may not receive a financial aid offer until after the May 1st deadline when most schools want a final decision from students.

Students are being asked to check with the schools they are applying to since many universities and colleges have extended deadlines to help students out.

According to NBC News, the Department of Education estimates roughly 7 million applications have already been submitted and sent off to schools and scholarship organizations, though some may need to be reprocessed. In the meantime, it said it has returned to normal FAFSA processing times of one to three days. The agency didn’t respond to requests for comment Wednesday.