Form 1098-T and FAFSA Grants Question

bchan1
Tue, 01 Feb 2011 15:17:44 +0000

I too am surprised by the way the school reported on the 1098 - same as OP’s situation except that D is a freshman. I asked the tax preparer if she needed to file and we were told no, there is only $1000 difference between scholarship (approx. $9000) and qualified expenses billed (approx. $8000). Because the numbers were reported differently than what I expected I was baffled - but her books and other supplies were not included in qualified expenses so it all sort of made sense after I got over the shock.

Then filing FAFSA - the way the question regarding earned income was worded did not seem to include scholarship so we left it blank (because she didn’t work in 2010). But then when I entered the 9K in scholarship $ later on it gave me an error message. I called FAFSA for clarification and put the 9K figure in as earned income on the first question as they told me to do and all went well from there on.

I hope this gets easier! I think in the long run it will be easier to file with figures the way the school reported it - not so much math for people to make mistakes with, just fill in the blank with the appropriate # but I wish they had given more explanation.