For those suggesting that the school should look at what other schools have … no. It doesn’t matter what other schools have. The school has correct information in their system, according to what they have confirmed with the student. The school can manually calculate the SAI. It’s what schools are supposed to do when they think that there might be a problem. If the calculation does not agree with what the school’s system shows it should be, the school has an obligation to investigate why it does not match. The only way to do this is to make sure that nothing in their own system is causing the SAI to be incorrectly calculated. There are a number of reasons that this could happen. If they thoroughly investigate and don’t find anything, there are professionals on the processor side that they can contact for help. What they should not do is ignore the issue … and if they actually are dealing with it, they need to tell the student that they are working on it.
Next time I call, I will ask them to recalculate by hand. I did not it was simple enough to calculate without a computer/the FAFSA system
Yes, there is a formula guide, and financial aid professionals can do it by hand.
It’s important to note that financial aid cannot be paid out unless the correct SAI is in the school’s system. So, while they can manually calculate, they can’t award any aid until they fix the problem so that the correct SAI is in their system. And it is their responsibility to ensure that they have the correct SAI. If you PM me with the school name, I’ll see if I can find an appropriate contact for you at the school - something along the lines of compliance manager might be on staff.
Update: The student reached out to the financial aid director, who responded promptly. The student’s FAFSA was manually updated, all aid was reinstated, and the grant even increased. Kudos to the student for following through!