GIVEN THE CURRENT ECONOMIC CLIMATE, stress levels for parents and families contacting the financial aid office have never been higher. At the same time, staffers are facing higher volumes—of FAFSA filers, appeals, and loan applications, for instance—than ever before. Without the proper training, systems, and protocols, this can be a recipe for disaster. The following pointers represent 10 effective practices to support customer service that have served financial aid offices well even during this most hectic summer and fall.
1. Avoid backlogs.
When financial aid offices fall behind in any step of the awarding process, whether it be verifying files, packaging aid, or certifying loans, it has a snowball effect. Families call when processes are delayed, and staff must handle those calls, which further delays processes. Therefore, keeping on top of the processing flow is critical—even if it means having to hire temporary staff or pay overtime.
Frontline staff members are the office as far as many students and parents are concerned.
2. Reduce required paperwork.
Review every required form you have to be sure you really need it. Even if the forms are electronic, they add steps to the process for both students and staff and can contribute to delays and increase frustration levels. For example, many institutions still require a signed award letter before releasing funds, even though federal requirements regarding signed acceptances were changed several years ago. Similarly, many institutions have separate applications for awards guaranteed to students based on information that could be captured in other ways. Institutions that offer sibling discounts, for instance, should capture that information on the admission application and then confirm it by checking registration records. No separate application should be necessary.
In future years, consider taking it one step further. If you require an application to award institutional aid, consider whether you really need that application, or whether the FAFSA and the admissions application provide you with sufficient information to make the awards.
3. Train the frontline staff well.
Frontline staff members are the office as far as many students and parents are concerned. They should be encouraged to go beyond the specific question asked, provided there is time. It’s also critical that these positions are filled by helpful people who provide accurate information and know when they don’t know an answer to a question. (Student peer counselors can make excellent frontline workers, but they need to be carefully trained and supervised to ensure they are accurate in their answers and sensitive to confidentiality issues.)
In addition, when a student is in the office or on the phone, frontline staff should take advantage of the opportunity by checking the student’s record to see if any materials are missing. If the student can complete the necessary forms during that visit, or at least be told that they are missing, the student will feel well served, and the office will complete files more quickly.
4. Cross train with staff from both the admissions and bursar’s offices.
At many institutions, the admissions staff have been trained to handle basic financial aid questions. That training gives them the ability to make outreach calls to incoming students to walk them through their award letters and identify students who may need to talk with a financial aid counselor or submit an appeal. This not only strengthens the relationship between the admissions officer and the students they are recruiting, but it also frees financial aid staff members to address more complex questions in a timely manner. Similarly, cross training between financial aid and bursar staffs can keep the student shuffle between offices to a minimum.
5. Optimize the use of the system.
A surprising number of aid offices still package manually, rekey data into different systems rather than uploading it, keep shadow systems for data that should be tracked in the main system, and do not provide online self-service (e.g., the ability to check missing items, submit forms, view aid offers). In most cases, it is not because the office is unaware of or resistant to these opportunities but is because the office needs assistance from IT to implement systems enhancements, and the IT staff is overloaded. Some institutions have found outsourcing certain system enhancement projects has produced significant benefits in terms of cash flow as well as student satisfaction.
