Paid tuition?

General Discussion for SMART Scholarship Recipients
guest24601

Paid tuition?

Post by guest24601 »

Has SMART paid anyone's tuition? I'm a graduate student and classes begin Monday. Tuition is due then as well.
I've sent in all the papers to my financial aid & third party billing services at the university. I believe they are just waiting on SMART to pay it. Anyone else?

Guest

Re: Paid tuition?

Post by Guest »

Make sure your school knows they have to send the bill to SMART. The instructions are clear on the letter but sometimes they just don’t do it.

NotToWorry

Re: Paid tuition?

Post by NotToWorry »

guest24601 wrote:Has SMART paid anyone's tuition? I'm a graduate student and classes begin Monday. Tuition is due then as well.
I've sent in all the papers to my financial aid & third party billing services at the university. I believe they are just waiting on SMART to pay it. Anyone else?
My school used to wait until after the add/drop date to bill SMART and then it was due a month later, so October. I would receive two invoices showing the bill due prior to this, but I was instructed by my school to ignore those. I would check with your school's Bursar's Office to confirm they have your scholarship details and when they plan to bill SMART.

Guest24601

Re: Paid tuition?

Post by Guest24601 »

NotToWorry wrote:
guest24601 wrote:Has SMART paid anyone's tuition? I'm a graduate student and classes begin Monday. Tuition is due then as well.
I've sent in all the papers to my financial aid & third party billing services at the university. I believe they are just waiting on SMART to pay it. Anyone else?
My school used to wait until after the add/drop date to bill SMART and then it was due a month later, so October. I would receive two invoices showing the bill due prior to this, but I was instructed by my school to ignore those. I would check with your school's Bursar's Office to confirm they have your scholarship details and when they plan to bill SMART.
My university is waiting until October. Thanks for the heads up!

BadBursar

Re: Paid tuition?

Post by BadBursar »

Depending on the quality of your institutions Bursar's Office, be prepared to remind them each semester that they need to bill SMART. I had to remind my Bursar no less than three times, often including a trip to see them in person, every single semester for 4 years. It grew very tedious very quickly.

Also, be wary of any refund checks your school offers you directly while SMART is paying the bill. Any refunds related to expenses that SMART paid for should be refunded directly to them. Do not accept the refund and direct the school to send it back to SMART directly. Do not accept the refund and then send it to SMART yourself, make the school send it directly. You do not want to do anything that might be construed as defrauding the government. Only accept a refund from your school if you're 100% positive that none of that money belongs to the government.

anothaguest

Re: Paid tuition?

Post by anothaguest »

guest24601make sure you follow-up (in person if possible like badbursar suggested) with your schools' external fellowship office.

i encountered a similar issue last year when i was waiting on SMART to pay my tuition, it turned out that they had never even received the bill, the fellowship office at my school had totally dropped the ball. it ended up being resolved after i literally sat in the office of the external fellowship analyst while they were sending over the grant transaction form. i followed up over the phone with my SMART POC to ensure they received the bill.

the amount that SMART covered was then incorrect. (again, in person) i met with the grad student advisor in my department, who was able to pull up my tuition for the entire year and i noticed that the number calculated for what SMART would pay was from the previous year, so she adjusted it right then and everything was all roses and butterflies after that.

all those annoying words to suggest this: understand each step and meet each person involved with your tuition payments, that way if there is an issue, you can resolve it.

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