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Hardware bill format for Financial Services

good evening new catamounts and families thank you so much for joining us this evening my name is Jan Hennis I'm going to be one of your presenters this evening I am going to be joined tonight by my colleagues Casey and Terry who will also be presenters my colleagues Sean and kirston who are behind the scenes and our Tech Guru Aaron this evening let's go over our agenda and briefly talk about our format this evening uh before we get started we have gathered a lot of commonly asked questions and we're going to go over those this evening in order to help you navigate some of the financial matters that you're going to come across while you're here at UVM we will have a Q&A session toward the end as well and we are going to go let me talk a little bit sorry about that let me talk a little bit about our questions and answers we will also have a Q&A feature which we're going to open about halfway through this presentation and I'll make that announcement so you know when it's available we are going to address as many questions as we can this evening but we know we're not going to be able to address all of them while they are you are putting some questions in our Q&A feature we're also going to be gathering those questions we may save some of those to the end so we can answer them to the whole group for everybody's benefit please understand that we are not able to address specific Financial circumstances this evening we certainly do want you to contact us and I'm going to pause here on this screen for a moment you can find a lot of information on our orientation site which is right there on the screen for the link you can also email us at uvm.edu SFS [Music] and you could also stop in and visit us we're going to have our address up on the screen a little bit later we're in the Waterman building and we're available for you to drop in between 10 and 4:30 before I start I do want to let you know that this session is being recorded and it will be available soon on our orientation page so let's dive in here's a common question question where is the bill and when is it due our bills are all posted online our students can find them in their student portal and our authorized proxy users will find them in their proxy user account our due date for the fall bill is Friday August 16th at 4:30 p.m. Easter daylight savings time for those of you that are planning ahead our spring term bills will be available mid December and will be due 4:30 p.m. Easter Eastern Standard Time on January 10th 2025 hard to think we're going that far ahead already another common question we get is how do I avoid a late fee and registration hold well the key thing is to make sure that you pay your balance by that due date there are a couple different ways to do that we're going to talk over some different payment options for you this evening we do have a monthly payment plan that you can enroll in um and we'll talk about that a little bit in a few slides please keep in mind to keep open communication with us maybe you have some funds coming from a 529 or an outside scholarship please remember we don't know about them until you tell us about them so please communicate with us at any time for some incoming funds at SFS uvm.edu that'll help us make sure that that gets noted on your account we know the mail has been slow L lately and some of those things take a little while to get here we do ask that you plan ahead and take in account that slow mail if something is coming that way but informing us is always a helpful way to make sure that you don't receive a late fee now for our proxy users they ask where do I log in to view my bill well your proxy account is accessed at go. uvm.edu SL proxy and our students have their login as well and I'm going to pause here just a second to remind you proxy users please use your proxy account students your account is yours and we're going to ask that you keep those separate if you have a shared computer at home there is something that happens sometimes if mom is in her proxy user account and later on the student tries to log into theirs sometimes it gets a little stuck in the computer usually a quick clear of your browser cache takes care of this problem you may have noticed on your statement your bill that you have a comprehensive fee and we got a lot of questions about what exactly is that comprehension fee this is a fee that helps to support all of the different programs and services that help our students success here at UVM that can be anything from library academic support Maybe even visiting speakers on campus now sometimes you're a proxy but you didn't get an email or any billing and you're wondering why that's not happening so I'm going to direct this part of my conversation to the students students are the ones who set up proxies and they're the only ones that can set up proxies so for my students who are watching this evening there's two parts to setting up a proxy the first part as you can see on your screen is the Pro profile that's where you're going to enter your proxy's name and their relationship and their email but there's a second part that second tab that circled in red says authorization this is where you get to authorize what types of financial information they can see on your account there's little checkboxes that you need to fill out without doing both of these your proxy will not have access now I do want remind you this is a financial proxy so for students please be assured this only gives Financial access your proxies do not have access to your bill I'm sorry not your bills they can see that they do not have access to your grades or your classes my apologies now with any luck all of our proxies are set up and everything is okay but they get a notice that they have to reset the their pin let me explain how to do this when if you are a proxy and you have to reset your pin you're going to go into the regular proxy login you're going to put in your email address and you're going to choose forgot pin this is going to generate an email to you and it's going to have an action password now this is really important you do need to copy that action password that email is going to have a link and you're going to need that action password to get into that link but you are also going to need it where you can see on this little second white screen here it says enter old pen now of course you can't enter your old pen because you forgot your old pin that's why you're here in the first place so that's where you're going to enter that action password then you're going to create a new pen now please remember the pen must be at least 16 digits I'm sorry at least six digits oh my goodness I should have had coffee before at least six digits and they are numeric this is unusual because we are so used to doing passwords with letters and numbers this is numbers only how can you make an online payment online payments are the quickest way to make a payment to your account online payments show up immediately and are credit to your students account right away students have access in their portal and proxies have access in their proxy portal under view accountant billing activity and make payments when you make a payment I am going to suggest to use that e Che option an e check requires your bank routing number and your account number there is no service fee with this option please remember that if use a credit card or a Deb deit card there is a 2.85% service fee I don't love those extra service fees so I'm going to give you a little tip to avoid them guest payers can also make a payment now this doesn't a guest payer does not need to be a proxy we have a section where guest payers can go in and make a payment with just the student name and their ID number their 95 number this is excellent if you have some family members that may want to help out along the lines to help with those payments it's also a great thing to ask for if one of your relatives says what do you want for your birthday or holiday well how about a little bit of help towards education always a good gift we do have a payment plan is it too late to set one up for the fall no it is not our payment plan you can still set up and get five payments um if you sign up by July 2 first our payment P plan is per semester we'll talk about it a little bit more later there is a $60 fee to set it up if you sign up by July 21st it'll be 20% down that will cover your July payment and then the payments will automatically pull from the account that you choose um on the following months so that means August September October and November being able to break that balance up for you now as some of you have received your bill perhaps you're seeing a health insurance charge and you're not quite sure why it's on there the University of Vermont like all universities are required to offer student health insurance now we can get rid of that if you fill out your insurance waiver if you are currently covered by an insurance plan and you do not need to purchase the UVM offered Insurance there is a insurance waiver that you need to fill out now the original deadline for that was on July 1st but don't worry you can still do it that's just why you're seeing it on your bill you're going to go to uvm.edu healthinsurance and fill out the waiver form this will ask you what your current insurance is and once that waiver is processed through our health and well-being services that charge will be reversed off of your bill don't forget that final waiver deadline is September 15th students this is on your student checklist so make sure you get this finished some of you may be seeing some changes on your bill from the initial um bill that that you had you might be seeing some activity going on let me explain a couple reasons why that may happen first thing to let you know is that we bill by regist ation and what that means is if your student is in the process of Shifting some classes maybe they need to get into a different section or maybe that early class really isn't going to be great for them you may see on your bill some charges coming off maybe the comprehensive fee going to a part-time fee and then some charges going back on that's the activity that's going on while your student is settling their final choices for classes you may also notice course fees on your bill those some classes have specific course fees and you might see those pop on as well another reason that you may see some changes on the bill could be because of housing charges some students have not received their final housing assignment at this point or just before we created our first fall bill that means that some students May May initially be buil the traditional standard double room rate when housing assignments are finalized that charge may be adjusted based on the final housing assignment can I get an updated Bill to show those changes you were just talking about on the account well here's some great news you already have access to it and I'm going to show you where to find it first thing I want to remind you is our statement is static that means that when we create it it is a capture in a moment of time of the charges and Aid or payments that were on that day anything that happens after the day we create that statement is not going to show up and be updated on that statement but don't worry you have access you can go either our students into their student account proxies into their proxy user account and go to view account and billing activity this is going to give you a more up to- the- moment um view of what's going on with your account seeing some of those payments that you might have made or some of those charge changes once you're on this screen you're going to click the little carrots on this left side of that and it'll drop down and it'll show you a full list of all of the payments now you can certainly save this screen print this screen people need some updated payment for all reasons but you have access to an upto-date bill right at your fingertips some of the aid may be listed on your bill as pending and you might be wondering what does that mean there's a couple different reasons that Aid might be listed as pending it may actually be too early for that payment to be added to your account one place where this is very common is with any federal aid federal aid cannot pay to a student's account until 10 days before classes start for us that means August 16th now don't panic we know that's the bill date we'll make sure to get that Aid on your account and applied before that happens before that 4:30 deadline other reasons that it might not be there is because there may be some additional action needed in order for the aid to be finalized now my colleague Casey is going to talk a little bit more about loans very very soon and she can inform you of all the things that you need to do just in case you have some pending Aid and you have some action items to complete now at this point in our presentation we are at about that halfway point at this point we are going to open our question and answer feature and I'm I'm going to turn the presentation over now to my colleague Casey who is going to talk to you a little bit more about federal work study and a variety of different loan options Casey hello um I'm Casey um so to start my part of the presentation um we'll go over um question why is my federal work study offer not on the bill um the big thing with federal work study is um it is paid to the student um directly um this is often times a a bi-weekly paycheck um which is paid Direct by direct deposit um federal work study funds um don't exist until they're earned so um it's important to keep in mind that um when you're planning on um funds to be able to um pay towards your bill um for the fall semester um the work study funds um shouldn't be um taken into account for for um paying that bill um what we suggest is um to kind of use those funds that you earn um students um towards like miscellaneous expenses um or spending money that you'll need um while you're here on campus um or maybe um consider um saving your your um pay um to pay towards your um spring semester books um and another common question is how do I get hired for a work um a federal work study job um the first thing is you would need to accept your um fedal work study offer um and that would be through your student portal um at my UVM um sorry myuvm do uvm.edu um um the these again um you can't pay um towards your August bill so you'll want to keep in mind that um in order to secure a job you'll want to look on the job X um database and that is available on the my UVM portal as well um the big deadline for federal work study is um August sorry October 1 first um at 4:30 p.m. so you'll want to make sure that you um look at all the jobs um make sure that you um get hired before then um and make sure that it it shows um in order to um keep that um the eligibility to be able to earn those those funds um you can locate that um by going to uvm.edu student employment um if for some reason you miss this deadline um there are other work study job or sorry there are other employment opportunities on campus um and are available through that same job portal um jobx um so you can look there for um those um and then also um around town um we're in close proximity to Church Street um which offers a lot of different employment opportunities um so you want to keep your an eye out out there um if for some reason you miss um the deadline or if you aren't offered um work study um another big question um so um we're kind of moving towards loans now um so one of the big biggest questions is what's the difference between the subsidized and unsubsidized direct um student loan um the the differences kind of lie with is how your uh the interest acrs um so for the subsidized Federal Direct Loan um while you're in if if you are offered this loan um while you're in school um enrolled at least half time um you would not acrew interest meaning that you you yourself um would not be um responsible for that um until you either drop below half time um or um you graduate and and the repayment would start um six months after one of those two um the uh direct subsidized loan is a need based loan so um that's based on your um FAFSA so um if you aren't offered that you would likely be offered um the unsubsidized loan um which I'll talk about now um so this is a non-need based loan but you do have to file a FAFSA in order to be eligible to borrow this type of loan um the interest on this loan it acrs um as soon as um it originates so once the money hits your account um it starts to um um acrw interest um from there um in terms of how how you would be able to borrow this loan um you would first need to um fill out the FAFSA um a part of your Aid offer you would likely get um offered Federal loans um in order to have that paid to your account you need to complete three steps um first you need to accept the loan um or part of the loan um and that would be through your UVM portal um once you've accepted um you'll then be um um asked to complete loan entrance counseling and a master promisory note um which are both to be completed on U student a.gov um the login for this um would be the same um it's the FSA ID that you used um to submit your FAFSA so you'll log in using that um same ID and then the password that you used um so if you have any trouble with that you'll want to contact um The Help Center there um another question that a lot of people have is uh why is the direct loan on the bill less than the award um that I was given um so a big thing with Federal loans uh or federal student loans is um that they have an origination fee um which means that the federal government takes um a portion of the um loan um off the top um for the subsidized and unsubsidized loans um that is uh 1.05 uh 7% um fee um so that means that about like if you borrow $1,000 the government will only send uh 990 to UVM um similarly um the Federal Direct um Parent PLUS Loan um it does have a higher origination fee um which is 4.22 eight% um so if you think about it the same way you borrow a th000 UVM gets 958 um and that that's what would show up on your bill not the Thousand um why is the scholarship from my community not listed on my bill um so like Jan said earlier in the presentation um you do have to notify us of any um scholarships that you have um because we don't know until you tell us um big thing to do is um if you are getting scholarship checks written out to you um yourself as a student um you would want to make sure that if you wanted it to go towards your um bill um you would want to sign over the um check U so you'd sign it with your name and then sign it over um as payable to UVM um and on the check you would want to make sure that it has your name and your ID number um scholarship checks and letters um can be sent to U Student Financial Services uh 223 Waterman building and Burlington Vermont 05405 um you can also email us um to let us know if you have the letter um that that's a good way to to let us know about those scholarships um another common question is how can I use financial aid and Loans to pay for books um so a lot of times um with financial aid um there is a way that um like you you'd get enough aid to cover your build costs um with that um any excess charges um or sorry any excess funds after those charges have been paid for um those can get refunded to you um so it's important to make sure to set up direct deposit um this is something that the student will need to do um in order to um to receive those funds um in terms of um that you'd want to do that through your myuvm portal um and any Financial refunds um they they would be processed the week of August 19th um we we strongly suggest you have a plan um to purchase books outside of this um just because um there's not a guarantee um that the funds will actually be received um before the start of class um another common question we get is how do I borrow a Federal Direct Parent PLUS Loan um how much do I need to borrow um The Parent PLUS Loan is a credit based loan um and it is in the parents name um the parent borrower would um apply at student a.gov using the same um FSA ID that they used um to complete the FAFSA um it is available up to the cost of attendance less any other Aid um so meaning that if you get get Aid outside of um that you you you can only get up to the cost of attendance um and it's also important um so if you say you have a $10,000 balance um you would want to make sure that you borrow more um in order to cover the origination fee um so if you have a $10,000 balance you'd want to borrow 10,441 um to cover that balance um you can use the Bill estimator tool at go. UVM sorry yeah go. uvm.edu forward estimate year Bill and uh what are the terms of the Federal Direct Parent PLUS Loan um so the parent plus loan has a a 10-year repayment period that um initially starts um as soon as you borrow it um there is an option to defer um repayment um but keep in mind that this loan does ACR interests as soon as it originates so um the interest rate for this year is 9.8% um so you'll want to make sure that you um keep that in mind you can make interest only payments on these loans um and that goes for student loans as well um so if if you have an unsubsidized loan you can you can pay interest only payments um so that it doesn't get added on um once you start repayment how can EXs uh plus loan funds be used um by my student to buy books um so like I said in the previous slide um there um you have the ability to borrow a parent plus loan up to the cost of attendance which includes both billable costs and then non-billable costs um if you want the um loan um funds the refund to go towards your student student um go to them directly you would need to make sure that you um select the Box um that says refund to student um otherwise um the parent would get a refund check um a physical check um sent to the um address um that you set up um when you were applying for that loan um what is a private private education loan and how do I learn more about borrowing this loan um so private Education Loans can be um used to um cover a portion of your bill or um the cost of attendance outside of um what UVM can offer or the federal government um it is a um a lot of these are credit based loans so um as a student um you generally would need a co-signer um there are also um private education loans that are are available to parents um and on our website um we do have a loan comparison tool called Elm select um to be able to know how much you need to borrow um you can use the estimator tool um which is the go. uvm.edu estimate your bill um and if you go to um our website you can um just search or um go to um go. uvm.edu private private loan um or you can just search private loans and that'll get you to the to the same place and um so at this point um we'll be um turning over the um presentation over to Terry um she'll be talking about um appeal and um things to look ahead um in the future thank you Casey that was very helpful and Jan appreciate your introduction um yes I would like to start with just the 529 savings plan as a payment method um if you have an educational fund um we um suggest that you request your distribution from that uh organization early for the due date of the fall semester if you are requesting a payment you would need to notify that agency of the student 95 UVM ID number and their name it's important to get that on the check memo line with that organization because every time a check comes into our lockbox it's immediately processed um our lockbox address um is where you would send it it's University of Vermont P box 1306 and it's in Williston Vermont a nearby town 05495 if you put Burlington Vermont it's going to be delayed so just want to bring that to your attention the other thing is the um organization is going to offer you to pay extra for overnight delivery and that actually may delay your payment because because a lockbox cannot accept an overnight delivery so let us know that you've requested your 529 plan email us and then we will make a notation on the account so that if there is delay in processing it it doesn't reach us by August 16th we will know about it and can avoid that late payment fee so how do I no notify uh our office if my family's Financial circumstances have changed and there is change we recognize that um the FAFSA does look at two years prior to the date of attendance so we're looking at 2022 income it's very possible that your family's resources have changed due to a change in your family structure a change of employment illness um something that has happened um we ask that you email us um just a brief um uh email to SFS uvm.edu let us know what has happened if you could provide a date that would be very helpful um I'd ask that you not send any private um sensitive information by email we will review your initial email then we will ask your you to upload some information I'm getting ahead of myself here um to the students record so that your information remains confidential and secure and here we are so uploading documents um for a special circumstance appeal we will put out a request to your student and they will log into their student portal and they will see the financial aid card and select view my requirements and there will be a link that will take them into this secure verification portal with tasks there and they will upload documents or complete some online forms we ask that you review for completion and signatures and some forms if it's a dependent student the parent will also be invited to electronically sign those forms by the student when how uh when will I know about the status of my special circumstances appeal so we will send notify you of the results of the appeal um hopefully that will provide more need-based Aid to the student and the family um if the appeal is approved the student would log into their UVM portal and see any revisions to their financial aid offer um it's important to note that um in this year of change um the FAFSA um we have just received permission from the uh Department of Education to begin to be able to make changes to the data of the FAFSA record and so appeals may not be ready in time for the August 16th bill but we will process them and if Aid is available it will be um awarded for the fall semester so we would ask you to review your account now and make plans to pay the bill with other means and then we can adjust that at a later point in time if the appeal is approved again I got a ahead of myself here what if my appeal request is not processed in time for the bill due date we are reviewing them as quickly as we can um and again it may not be ready in time for the due date so we'd ask you to use your Current financial aid award for planning and and bill payment while it's being considered so occasionally a student um does need to withdraw from the University something has you know happened and hopefully this this isn't your situation but if it is I would like to make you aware of our tuition refund schedule if a student does need to withdraw in the first two weeks of the semester that would classes begin August 26 and so by September 9th 100% of the tuition and fees would would be cancelled from the students account um that is for medical and non-medical withdrawals if a student um something happens between September 10th and September 16th that's the date of withdrawal then 50% of the tuition and fees would be cancelled and so on and so forth for the next uh period of time would be 25% um but please please note that after September 23rd there would be no refund of the tuition and fees for the semester they would be fully do if a student does withdraw within this time period though and they are a residential student the housing and meal plans will be pro-rated or adjusted for the time that they lived on campus and after the 23rd the full uh residential fees would also be um outstanding now if we are adjusting tuition we would also be adjusting financial aid so I want to keep that in mind that um if a student is considering withdrawing it's good to talk with our office about the that impact do I have to file the FAFSA annually to receive my merit scholarship no you've earned that Merit scholar scholarship congratulations um that is guaranteed for up to eight semesters um the requirements are that you maintain full-time enrollment that's 12 credits or more for the fall and the spring semesters um the requirement of a cumulative GPA of 3.0 or greater um is evaluated so we'll go a full year fall and spring and at the end of the spring semester we'll look at that cumulative GPA if it's at 3.0 then the scholarship is renewed for the upcoming second year how do I maintain eligibility for need-based and federal financial aid so with the FAFSA that is what determines um the financial need of a student it's called called the S the student aid index um and that number looks at the family finances if it's a dependent student if it's an independent student it would look at the students resources um and awards may change based on changes in F family finances so it's important to um file the FAFSA each year so that we can review and make Financial offers to you another important important thing to to remember is that financial aid does require that the student is making academic progress we call it satisfactory academic progress sap for short not the maple syrup kind um what this means is that the student is progressing towards their degree um they need to complete 67% of their credits attempted so that a student that is enrolling in classes but withdrawing from them during the semesters if they're frequently doing that their completion rate will be dropping so we want to make sure that they're aware of that and work with their academic advisors in the college and make a good plan each semester to not overwhelm themselves with courses but enough challenging courses so that they are advanced towards their goals and that brings us to the end of this part of the presentation and I would like to introduce my colleague Kirsten who will be has been Gathering questions in the background and we will be happy to answer those at this time we want you to know that we are here to help our contact information is here as Jan had indicated earlier we have um a lot of videos at our orientation page you can email us you may call us um the office here in Waterman 223 is open 10 to 4:30 Monday through Friday um You can call before that time please know we are here working at 8: a.m We are doing uh processing time during those early hours thank you Terry the first question I have is regarding a 529 plan uh we have quite a few folks that are asking if 529 plan payments can be sent electronically versus mailing a paper check that's a great question I think it's challenging to mail them electron or send them electronically and the reason is it's going to go into the greater University treasury um uh electronic fund and then get processed so we really recommend that a paper check be sent to our lockbox rather than um trying to obtain that um checking and routing information and having it processed that way all right we do have a couple of parents that have been set up as a proxy but they're having trouble getting it to work um could could you maybe offer some advice for how to troubleshoot for proxy access sure um so the first thing I would check is that uh their student has authorized them and identified their relationship as a proxy that sometimes is the first initial um uh step I would take so they student enters their email address and they um then the student would then expand on their proxy's name and they would check off the re um the uh authorization Tab and hit all the boxes so that they have access to accounts receivable which would be we could talk with them about their student account and the financial aid boxes so that we could talk about their financial aid offer if that's all done then the parent gets an email they log in and they create a pin um which is all um numeric no Alpha um so sometimes I said just maybe um a special date an anniversary date would be the pin of the parent or um other party the um other thing I would recommend is to um we did talk about the cash um if you're regist uh signing in on the same computer um that it fully logging out the other user if they're not getting in if that's not working I certainly would ask you to email our office SFS uvm.edu and we would have be happy to do a teams call with you to determine how to resolve the login issue uh a screenshot is helpful too so that we can um review and get that taken care of with you because that can be very frustrating and I'm sorry that you're having that experience thanks Terry um we have someone asking if they can change the amount of the loan that they had planned to borrow that they already accepted and were approved for um if they did not account for the origination fee sure that's an app Parent PLUS Loan I'm presuming with the origination fee yes they can go back into student a.gov and they would click on apply for a plus loan and there's a button there that says I would like to make an adjustment to my loan now if um they aren't sure of the amount that they would like to borrow additionally we could use our billing estimator that's on our UVM website to calculate the differential for the origination fee the amount that they're short because they wouldn't want to short it again with the origination fee on that amount um the other thing I'd say is um give us a call give us an email and we'll be happy to help you too this one is a two-parter um this family is wondering if they will receive any other bills during the 2425 year besides the current bill for the fall semester and the spring semester build in December and then part two of that is they can they assume that the spring bill will be roughly equivalent to the fall Bill okay that's that's a good question my crystal ball is a little cloudy though today um the the bill would be accurate um with the caveat that if the student isn't changing residence halls or changing their meal plan or collecting library books and not returning them and there's some Library findes things like that um yes the fall bill should be complete um the only changes would be those change of fees if the student is adding a dropping courses course fees would be removed uh from the bill if the student is adding insurance or waving Insurance those are other adjustments um just so the families know we do present uh a statement monthly if there's any change on the bill so that would be coming to the student and any proxies that are identified that they would be identified by email that there is a bill out there for them to review the spring part of that question is yes the bill is generally the same for the spring semester give or take a dollar um with the um odd award amounts so if an award ends in a five uh one semester is going to have a dollar more than the other um the only difference would be as if the student has been awarded several outside scholarships and those are dispersed um only in the spring semester or only in the fall semester that would account for a differential on the um fall and spring bill all right um this caml is wondering if we recommend that they apply or accept their full year financial aid um upfront or if they should do it on a semester basis accepting their loans I presume and work study maybe yes okay um it's it's certainly a personal decision if they have other resources um the loan if they are going to accept the loan they could accept it for both semesters it is always possible to make a change if the loan um if they accept the loan in the fall and then they realize they do not need it for the spring semester I do want to be cautious though with the federal work study is that if a student does not accept their award by October 1st that award will be cancelled so it's very important that if they do want that option to work a work study position they do need to accept that award if they don't want to accept the fall award only the spring award they need to send an email to us indicating that so that we reserve that spring award for them all right this attendee is wondering um if you could explain a little bit more about what the down payment is is in regard to the monthly payment plan um and the time frame for when um those are due sure sure so for the fall semester the maximum payment plan is a five month payment plan that began July 1st so that would be um sign up for the payment plan and then it's Auto debited to the account that the person registers and enroll in the payment plan um hopefully they're not using a credit card which would incur a 2.85% additional fee so if um someone re enrolls in the payment plan by July 21st they will be asked to make that first payment for July that July um 20% down 1 15 and then they would have four remain in payments August 1st the auto debit would occur so it's going to come close those first two payments then um August September October and November 1st that would November 1st is the end of the Fall payment then the spring plan would begin December 1st through April 1st so if family doesn't register for the payment plan by July 21 1 they can register up to between those dates to August 23rd and at that point they would have a for payment plan where 25% would be down due at the time they enroll 25% down is 1/4 and then they would have three more payments September 1st October 1st and November 1st If the parents of a student Happ to be divorced and are planning to apply for private loans or Plus Loans what is the process for that does each parent need to apply for their own loan Ah that's a that's a really good question so many of our families are with two households and each are contributing to their child's education so it's really um the choice of the family how they would like to do it so here's some options um a student would apply for a private loan and identify a co-signer is it possible that they would CH have one parent do one semester and the other parent do another semester or would they do two loans with each parent in the same semester I guess if that's um not too confusing that's um also something to consider with the payment plan if I could um go answer that a little bit I know this has come up so if if we have two households and the student wishes to do a payment plan there are two options there um with the we can only have one payment plan per student so one parent could do one semester the other parent could do the second semester or the student can um create the payment plan with a separate account and the two parents can contribute their portion to that account and that payment plan would Auto deit from the students joint account that the parents are contributing to can you pay the interest on an unsubsidized loan while a student is still in school and do they do that through us or through the federal site that's a great question so to keep that loan from growing while the student is enrolled yes you can make interest only payments on the unsubsidized loan you don't have to but you can um so once that student the student uh loan is paid to UVM then the federal government is going going to assign a loan serer it's a company that will manage the repayment of that loan and the billing once the student is graduated and repaying it so they would contact the servicer and they would in uh indicate that they would like to make a payment they can do that um create an online um link to the the serer and that serer will be notifying the student um of of um their contact information that also will be listed at student a.gov under the students login once the servicer is established it takes about um 40 days after the loan is paid before the serer is connected to the loan if an outside scholarship is received after the semester has already started how do we handle that does it still get deducted from tuition well the the payment would be applied to the student account as um a um a payment source and if it overpays the account we can refund the student um with the direct deposit signed up whichever count they enter the student can enter a bank account information there whether it's the student's individual account or a parent account whatever they would like to enter um the other thing is a student can if they send in a um an outside scholarship at a later point they can also ask us to keep it on the account for a future semester's payment we do have a couple questions asking um for clarification regarding merit scholarship renewal policies and what happens if a scholarship were to be terminated yes that is um a challenge so it's not lost um is what I'd like to say is that um the uh we renew we review at the end of the spring as I indicated after the first year if the student is not making that 3.0 Mark then the scholarship is uh removed for a year and that student can remain enrolled and work back to get to to the 3.0 as long as they're still in their undergraduate degree program that scholarship can be returned to them in the third year and fourth year do we offer tuition insurance we do not offer tuition Insurance um there is there are some private agencies that uh families can contact about that that but we have not um offered that will Community or outside scholarships affect the amount of my merit scholarship like the presidential scholarship no it would not impact a merit scholarship award I guess the only time it would impact a merit scholarship award if it was very significant so uh there's the cost of attendance budget that um is all the costs associated with the student attending and then they have a um uh a need indicator that Sai number that I mentioned uh the student aid index the difference between those two numbers is financial need and so a student can have um uh outside scholarships up to the total cost of attendance do all private loans need to be paid before the due date or is a commitment letter from the lender sufficient if the timing is tight so we ask that the private loan application be completed and the student or parent I I guess it would be the student because the private loan is probably in their name um although there are some parent private loans as long as they have uh completed the application we can wait for those funds to come in um with every private loan we are notified by the lender to certify the amount fits into the students financial aid budget with their other Aid so we generally are notified if it's getting close to that time the due date August 16th we ask that they contact us by email with the amount don't have to prove to us with a a letter of commitment to say I'm borrowing X loan from of this amount for the F for the year or for the fall semester and we will notate that on the account to avoid that late payment fee and clear the account is the UVM outof State Grant or need-based Grant considered a merit scholarship and do the same rules apply that UVM um Grant is a need-based award and that is um awarded to a student based on their need indicator from the FAFSA so it's has um the uh rules for satisfactory academic progress to be maintain eligibility and to maintain academic standing with their college but it does not um uh follow the requirements for the Merit Scholarships of a cumulative 3.0 that we review in the springtime this parent is wondering how they can accept their students loans in their student portal I'm sorry the question again was a student accepting or a parent accepting the parent wants to know if they can accept a student's aid for them thank you that's why I I was asking um a parent cannot accept a a loan um for a student the student is accepting the loan those are student action steps and it is a legal document that the student is signing with the Department of educ ation so it's very important that the student complete those documents rather than the parent they need to have the awareness of the financial obligation and their rights and responsibilities as a federal borrower I think we have time for about one more question Kirsten if you'd like to uh choose one all right let me pick the best one here these have been great questions tonight thank you so much all right so this parent is wondering if they can pay in installments kind of outside of that monthly payment plan or do they have to have the entire Bill settled um by the um bill due date in August yes uh so we do need to have a plan for payment full payment with a payment plan or other source of funding by the due date so it is a formal payment plan that the the family would need to um commit to um or a loone sometimes our families do part loan part payment plan with a number that may fit into their monthly budget um if there's any um discussion or or review that is needed we would be happy to uh uh counsel you about um your options you certainly can email us and we can arrange um to speak with you about um what is possible for payment okay I'd like to thank you very much for attending this evening um as Jan indicated this session will be prepared with captioning and then posted at our orientation page which is on the screen at the moment it all will also be on this new student um uh orientation page um I'm sorry I'm not thinking of the name new student Insight sessions that's a tongue twister thanks again