How to Avoid Common Errors Completing the FAFSA

Below are suggestions for avoiding common errors made by students when filling out the FAFSA. Errors can delay processing your forms, which could delay receipt of financial aid.

Common errors:

• COMPLETE EVERYTHING. DO NOT LEAVE ANY LINE BLANK. Instructions listed on the FAFSA pertain to students enrolled at Yale School of Medicine. Parental information is entered on the Need Access application.  

• If you are not a U.S. citizen or a permanent resident, list your Alien Registration Number (item #15) on the paper application or indicate on the website pre-application worksheet that you are neither a citizen nor an eligible non-citizen.
• Be sure you have a Social Security number. No FAFSA will be processed if you don’t have one.  
• Be sure to provide all income, earnings, benefits and asset information.
• Only enter a spouse's wages (item #39) if you are married or will get married during the 2008-2009 academic year.
• When student and spouse are both working, don’t combine the wages (items #38 and #39). You must list each one individually, the student’s on item #38 and the spouse’s on item #39.
• Don’t combine items #44 (current investments) and #45 (business and/or investment farms) with a bracket, and don’t list their value on a single line. These items are assessed differently in the Need Analysis. If you combine them, you may be assessed incorrectly.
• Complete one of items #97a, 97c, 97e and 97g with one of the following EDE codes:
  EOO450: Yale University School of Medicine, New Haven CT 06510
  E00447: Yale University Physician Associate Program, New Haven, CT 06510