Automated Exception Management

Exceptions occur when transactions, such as batches or individual student disbursements, cannot be processed successfully. When an exception occurs as part of an automated process, manual intervention is necessary to resolve the exception and allow the transaction involved to be resubmitted for automatic processing.

The Automated Exception Management form provides a user interface for the display of exceptions to staff members or staff groups that have been assigned to receive them. Users can then resolve the exceptions by making changes to the transaction or the supporting information.

The Automated Delegate Staff Group will drive the Automated Exception Management configuration.

As Systems Administrator

You can configure Automated Exception Management for all staff groups and staff members as needed.

If you are logged into the student information system as the System Administrator, you will have full security rights to the Automated Exception Management screen.

You can route exceptions to all staff groups and all staff members regardless of the Delegate Staff Group configuration.

Assigning View-Only Permissions to Any User

Financial Aid Administrators can assign view-only permissions to users so that they can assist students in resolving financial aid exceptions. Users can search on one or more of the following identifiers to find exceptions:

Student#
Student (First/Last Name)
Student SYSID / Student ID
Users can see all outstanding open exceptions on the Financial Aid Exceptions form and can see the steps needed to resolve the exception, but they will not be able to resolve any exception.

All Other Users

You will need to be given appropriate security access to the Financial Aid Exceptions form to access it.

You will only be able to route exceptions to staff members or staff groups for which you are responsible as configured in the Automated Delegate Staff Group configuration. The staff groups and staff members available for selection when configuring exception routing will be filtered based on this configuration.

If you are not responsible for a staff member or staff group in the Automated Delegate Staff Group setup, you will not be able to set up routing for exceptions.

If you are logged in as a student information system user and the staff group that you are in has been given access to Financial Aid Exceptions, you can route exceptions based on the Automated Delegate Staff Group configuration.

Exception Types and Codes

Types	Code
COD Export	CODEXPRT####
COD Import	CODIMPRT####
Disbursement Batch	DISBBTCH####
Disbursement Eligibility	ELIGBLTY####
Global Academic Extract	GLBLADDR#### / GLBLPRPL####
Print Checks	PRINTCHK####
Refund	RFNDPYMT####
Auto Packaging	AWARDPOP#### In Financial Aid Automation 24.2.0 and later, all exceptions related to SFAAA Initial (Auto Packaging) are renamed from AWARDPOP#### to AUTOPACK####.
Auto Repackaging	REPACKAG####
Auto Refund Calculation	REFDCALC####
STAR Global	STARGLBL####
STAR COD	STARCODE####
STAR CommonLine	STARCMLN####
Stipend	STIPNDSP####
Subsidiary	SUBSIDSP####

2022-23 Updates - Direct Loan Cost of Attendance (DLCOA)

Exception ELIGBLTY0226

From the 2022-23 award year onwards, FAA Disbursement Eligibility evaluates an individual Direct Loan amount with the associated DLCOA and creates exception ELIGBLTY0226 when the Direct Loan amount is less than the DLCOA for that loan period. With this exception in Open status, validation during COD Export Exception will be bypassed as this loan is Failed in the Eligibility process. However, when this eligibility exception is overridden, COD Export will not create an exception for the same validation and will export the Direct Loan to COD.

When attempting to resolve the exception, a user needs to resolve/override all the disbursements for the Direct Loan.

Note: A COD Export exception for a DLCOA will only be generated if Disbursement Eligibility is disabled for the campus within Automated Processes. Only generating a single exception, so as not to duplicate the same exception through two different job processes, is intended functionality.

Be aware that COD Export, however, validates the same Direct Loan when that loan has an open or overridden Eligibility exception and when Disbursement Eligibility is disabled for that campus.

Once this ELIGBLTY0226 exception is created and stays open along with the DE job active for the respective campus, a COD Export exception will not be created when the COD Export job is run and a file will not get created.

Once the ELIGBLTY0226 exception is overridden, a COD Export exception will not be created when the COD Export job is run and the fund will be sent to COD. Leveraging the same functionality of the exporting disbursements when the selected disbursements have open ELIGBLTY exceptions.

The Eligibility process will continue to evaluate this loan until the loan is accepted by COD.

From the award year 2022-23 onwards, COD Export will evaluate every new Direct Loan amount against the DLCOA at the time of origination. This ensures that the sum of all Direct Loan amounts that are reported to COD is less than or equal to the DLCOA of that loan period. For the programs that are using payment periods, the DLCOA will be pulled from the Loan Periods Configuration. However, for standard term programs, the DLCOA is pulled from the new field on the individual Direct Loan Award form.

COD Export Direct Loan Cost of Attendance CODEXPRT0228 Exception

A new COD Export exception, CODEXPRT0228 ("Direct Loan Cost of Attendance (DL COA) is either missing or less than the Direct Loan award amount"), will be created if the DLCOA is missing or less than the sum of the Direct Loan amount for that loan period. The validation will be made from the DLCOA on the Award form against the Direct Loan amount that is set to be reported to COD. Per COD rules, once the DLCOA is reported to COD and the loan is accepted, reporting this tag again is not mandatory on any further export of disbursements.

This exception is created at the award level and not for each disbursement for the loan, even though disbursement eligibility performed its evaluation using the DLCOA field details.

In addition, a new tag for Payment Period End Date will be added ensuring that this date is not outside the Loan Period End Date or the Disbursement Date range. Payment Period Start Date will report for loans as well as grants ensuring this date is not outside the valid date range as specified in the COD Technical Reference document.

Visit the link for more details: https://fsapartners.ed.gov/sites/default/files/2021-12/2223CODTechRefVol3.pdf

FAA COD Export will now store the Incarcerated Student Indicator, Payment Period Start Date, and Payment Period End Date for any disbursement sent to COD. The same information is stored during the Import process, ensuring disbursements that were released are appropriately updated within the system. The Incarcerated Student Indicator will only be stored or updated if the tag is present in the incoming file of any message classes.

ELIGBLTY0025

The Exception Processing screen for ELIGBLTY0025 has been updated to reflect the logic for a loan that was certified/originated after the student's LDA. The ELIGBLTY0025 exception uses the "Origination/Certified before LDA" flag on the Disbursement Approval Criteria (DAC). This flag enables users to prevent loan disbursements from auto-approving when a student withdraws temporarily or permanently before a loan is originated or certified.

The steps to resolve disbursement eligibility exception ELIGBLTY0025 have been updated to accurately reflect the processing logic for the "Originated/Certified before LDA" option on the DAC. The updated steps are as follows:

PROBLEM

Disbursement evaluation failed because the loan was certified/originated after the student's LDA.

SOLUTION

Navigate to Student Profile > Financial Aid Tile > Awards.
Verify the Origination Date for that fund and compare that to the student's LDA.
Navigate to Student Profile > Academic Records Tile > Enrollments.
Verify the student's LDA and ensure that the LDA is after the fund origination date.
Check the student's school status to ensure that the student is still attending or expected to attend but LDA is not captured.
If the loan is attempted to originate after LDA, cancel the loan and revise the packaging.

– OR –

Determine why the loan wasn't processed until the student's LDA is captured and explain the case to Support (1-800-483-9106).

FAFSA Simplification 2024-25

ELIGBLTY0227 - Evaluate Pell amount using Enrollment Intensity

A new Automated Disbursement Eligibility Exception ELIGBLTY0227 validates that the 2024-25 Pell disbursement amount is in adherence with the Actual Enrollment Intensity of that term. It is created when the Pell Amount is not as per the Actual Enrollment Intensity by calculating the appropriate eligible Pell amount for that student, for that term, for that award year.

This ELIGBLTY0227 exception is:

Applicable only for Pell awards
Applicable only for Academic Calendars 1, 2, 3, and 4
Applicable only for the award years 2024-25 and later
The Disbursement Approval Criteria has the "Pell Enrollment Intensity - Package=Actual" field enabled

The exception details capture the following:

Actual Enrollment Intensity: This is the Actual Enrollment Intensity from the Award form
Packaged Enrollment Intensity: This is the Packaged Enrollment Intensity from the Award form
Estimated Pell Amount for this disbursement: This is the Calculated Pell Amount based on the Disbursement Eligibility Process

ELIGBLTY0227 will continue to override so that the disbursements can be released under the user’s responsibilities.

ELIGBLTY0227 is created as follows:

Non-Term Calendar = The Enrollment Intensity (EI) will always be 100% and it is always divided by 2 (number of payment periods)
Quarters (AC2) = (Scheduled amount * EI for the term (if null or blank use 100% / 3) = potential amount per term
Semesters (AC3) /Trimesters (AC4) = (Scheduled amount * EI for the term (if null or blank use 100% / 2) = potential amount per term
AC 1 SE9W & NON-SE9W = (Scheduled amount * EI for the term (if null or blank use 100% / no. of terms in AY) = potential amount per term
Student version of 24.1.x is required

Disbursement evaluation failed due to mismatch in the Enrollment Intensity:

Step 1: Navigate to Student Profile > Financial Aid > Awarding Tile
Step 2: Verify the Actual Enroll Intensity that is showing up against the disbursement.
Step 3: Compare Actual Enroll Intensity with Packaged Enroll Intensity to ensure both are same.
Step 4: Update the Packaged Enroll Intensity matching to the Actual Enroll Intensity and select Recalculate Pell Eligibility.

ELIGBLTY0228 - Evaluate Pell amount using Est Award Year COA & Pell COA

Automated Disbursement Eligibility evaluates 2024-25 Pell disbursements to ensure the Pell Award Amount is less than or equal to the Estimated Award Year COA and full-time Program Pell COA (For more details, see Pell Grant). A Disbursement Eligibility Exception (ELIGBLTY0228) is created when the Pell amount is found to be outside the Estimated Award Year COA or the full-time Program Pell COA. This exception is routed to the assigned user and can be seen on the Financial Aid Exception page.

The ELIGBLTY0228 exception displays the following details:

Est Award Year COA
Pell Cost Of Attendance
Pell Amount

The Automated Disbursement Eligibility exceptions ELIGBLTY0051, ELIGBLTY0069, and ELIGBLTY0089 will not be created for Pell for the award years 2024-25 and later.

Prerequisites

You must have:

Common - Configuration - View authorization
Financial Aid Automation - Configuration - Automated Exception Management - Delete, Edit, New, and View authorization.

Access Method

Select the Configuration tile > expand Financial Aid > select Automated Exception Management.