Federal Student Aid’s (FSA) Payment Vehicle Account (PVA) Program Pilot
School Selection Survey
Instructions:
Federal Student Aid (FSA), an office of the United States Department of Education, intends to pilot a Payment Vehicle Account (PVA) program. On October 17, 2018, FSA published in the Federal Register a Notice inviting Applications from prospective Pilot Implementers, i.e., parties to implement a pilot of a Payment Vehicle Account Program (link). On November 2, 2018, FSA published in the Federal Register an amendment to that Notice inviting Applications (link).
FSA now invites postsecondary educational institutions (institutions) that are interested in participating in the Payment Vehicle Account (PVA) program pilot to submit answers to the following application questions.
Institution application submissions should be in a PDF attachment to an email message sent to FSAPaymentVehicle@ed.gov. The subject line of the email message should read “PVA Institution Request to Participate.” The submission should be on institutional letterhead and signed by the institution’s chief financial aid director, and the institution’s chief financial officer.
The application submission should provide a mailing address, email address, and telephone number of a contact person at the institution. FSA may contact this person if there are questions regarding your institution’s submission.
For further information email FSAPaymentVehicle@ed.gov.
Background:
The selection of institutions will be guided by an individualized determination approach. No specific selection criteria will be developed and there are no bright-line rules. School selection will be made on a case-by-case basis and take into account a totality of circumstances based on various factors, including but not limited to, responses to the questions below, the overall pool of interested institutions, and what both FSA and the selected Pilot Implementers believe will best serve the purpose and goals of the pilot.
Additionally, FSA will consider an institutions’ track record in the administration of student financial assistance programs authorized under title IV of the Higher Education Act, as amended (HEA). When selecting institutions, FSA will consider all information available about an institution including, but not limited to, evidence of programmatic compliance.
School Selection Application Questions:
Given the limitations on providing data resulting from the comingling of aid at the institutional-level, please define “aid recipients” to include all categories of aid recipients when answering the following questions.
What is your institution’s six-digit OPEID number?
What is the name of your institution?
Describe your institution’s level of interest in participating in this pilot.
If your institution has multiple campuses, are you interested in having all institution locations participate in this pilot or only your principal location?
If you are not interested in having all institution locations participate in this pilot, provide the estimated total enrollment of all campus locations for which you are interested in having participate.
What methods for credit balance refunds does your institution currently offer to aid recipients?
What is the process and schedule for how and when aid recipients who are selecting a credit balance refund method for the first time at your institution (i.e., freshman students, transfer students, etc.) select their method?
Once an aid recipient selects a credit balance refund method, is that selected method the default method used for any potential future credit balance refunds? If no, what is the process and schedule for how and when aid recipients who are re-selecting a credit balance refund method at your institution select their method?
What is the process and schedule for which aid recipients who already selected a credit balance refund method at your institution may change their selection (i.e., may the aid recipient request an alternative method at any time or can the aid recipient only change it at certain times)?
What is the general schedule for when in the year an aid recipient may receive his or her credit balance refund? If the schedule and timing differ based on factors such as cohort, program, or other factor, please explain.
For the following questions, define fiscal year 2018 (FY18) as beginning on October 1, 2017 and ending on September 30, 2018.
In fiscal year 2018, how many unique (unduplicated) aid recipients received a credit balance refund?
In fiscal year 2018, how many aid recipients received a credit balance refund for each month? Please use the table below. For purposes of this question, a single aid recipient may be counted multiple times if he or she received multiple credit balance refunds.
FY18 Month |
Number of Aid Recipients |
October 2017 |
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November 2017 |
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December 2017 |
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January 2018 |
|
February 2018 |
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March 2018 |
|
April 2018 |
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May 2018 |
|
June 2018 |
|
July 2018 |
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August 2018 |
|
September 2018 |
|
In fiscal year 2018, what was the total dollar amount your institution disbursed to aid recipients in credit balance refunds?
In fiscal year 2018, what was the breakdown of the total dollar amount your institution disbursed to aid recipients in credit balance refunds for each month? Please use the table below.
FY18 Month |
Dollar Amount Disbursed |
October 2017 |
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November 2017 |
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December 2017 |
|
January 2018 |
|
February 2018 |
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March 2018 |
|
April 2018 |
|
May 2018 |
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June 2018 |
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July 2018 |
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August 2018 |
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September 2018 |
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When responding to the following two questions, please refer to the listed Information for Financial Aid Professionals (IFAP) postings for relevant background information and definitions. Please also note that disclosing this information to FSA as part of this application submission does not relieve your institution of its obligation to report this information through proper and established reporting methods.
For fiscal year 2019 or fiscal year 2020, does your institution currently have or plan to have a tier one (T1) arrangement with a third-party servicer for the service of disbursing Federal student financial aid? If yes, please provide details regarding the third-party servicer and the arrangement your institution has with the service provider.
For fiscal year 2019 or fiscal year 2020, does your institution currently have or plan to have a tier two (T2) arrangement with a financial institution or other entity? If yes, please provide details regarding the third-party servicer and the arrangement your institution has with the service provider.
Paperwork Burden Statement
According to the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995, no persons are required to respond to a collection of information unless such collection displays a valid OMB control number. The valid OMB control number for this information collection is 1845-NEW. Public reporting burden for this collection of information is estimated to average 15 hours per response, including time for reviewing instructions, searching existing data sources, gathering and maintaining the data needed, and completing and reviewing the collection of information. The obligation to respond to this collection is voluntary. If you have comments or concerns regarding the status of your individual submission of this application, please contact FSAPaymentVehicle@ed.gov directly.
| File Type | application/vnd.openxmlformats-officedocument.wordprocessingml.document |
| Author | Malone, Emily |
| File Modified | 0000-00-00 |
| File Created | 2021-01-15 |