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The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
The Office of Scholarships & Student Aid
Understanding Your Award
rtal, is now the official method by which students receive information regarding their personal financial aid application.
Email is the primary means of communication between students and the UNC Office of Scholarships and Student Aid. Emails are sent to the email address listed in the student's UNC Directory record. To guarantee you receive important information from our Office, please confirm the accuracy of your University email address by completing the following steps:
Viewing financial aid information online through Student Central is secure and safe. To ensure that only you have access to your personal information, do not share your ONYEN username and password with any unauthorized individuals. (If you do not already have an ONYEN, review our "Checking Your Status" webpage to learn about creating an ONYEN. If you have questions regarding the use of your ONYEN, please visit the ONYEN management page at onyen.unc.edu.) When you have completed viewing your online information, please remember to close your Student Central and financial aid browser windows for security purposes.
It is recommended that you print your e-FAN and any other pertinent online documentation for the purpose of maintaining a personal paper file of important financial aid materials.
If you are having technical difficulty accessing your financial aid information online, please visit help.unc.edu and use the "Submit a Help Request" link to submit a problem ticket, or call the UNC Technical Support Help Desk at 919-962-HELP(4357) to report the problem you're having.
Viewing your personal financial aid documentation online is quick and easy! The financial aid related information available via Student Central is organized in the following sections:
You will be notified by email at the email you have entered at directory.unc.edu and instructed to visit the Student Central Portal when your financial aid award is complete and after any subsequent award revisions. Your Student Central online award will list the specific types of aid received, the corresponding dollar amounts and, in some cases, special messages or instructions relating to your awards. These "Messages" and instructions are of particular importance and you will need to read them carefully. For example, certain types of awards require the completion of documentation before funds will be released.
The "Enrollment Assumptions", listed above your award, are used in determining your cost of attendance and the types/amounts of financial aid for which you may be eligible. If your enrollment changes or you believe that the current assumptions on file are incorrect, please notify the UNC Financial Aid Office.
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It is not necessary to contact the Office of Scholarships and Student Aid in order to accept your award; your award funds will be credited automatically to your student account in the Cashier's Office. In the event that a particular scholarship, grant, or loan will not automatically post to your student account, you will receive specific instructions on how to access these funds.
If you wish not to accept any portion of your financial aid award or you wish to reduce the amount of a loan, you must contact the Office of Scholarships and Student Aid.
Stafford Loans - If you are a first-time borrower of a Stafford Loan, federal regulations require that you complete a Student Loan Counseling Session before the first disbursement of your loan can be made. To complete this requirement, visit the Mapping Your Future website at mappingyourfuture.org/se.
If you choose to borrow a Stafford Loan, please review our list of Preferred Lenders for Federal Stafford Loans. First-time borrowers should complete the Master Promissory Note with your lender of choice.
Perkins Loans - If you are the recipient of Federal Perkins Loan, you must complete an online Master Promissory Note before funds can be transferred to your student account. To complete the promissory note, please visit https://www.ecsi.net/promj6.
If you have questions about the Perkins MPN website, please contact Loan Repayment Services at 919-962-9481. Your FAFSA PIN is required to complete this process. If you do not remember your PIN, visit the Dept. of Education's website for assistance at pin.ed.gov.
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The Office of Scholarships and Student Aid often requires verification of information submitted on the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) or the submission of new information in addition to the FAFSA. This information is a vital part of the aid process and must be submitted before financial aid eligibility and awards can be determined. In other instances, we will request new information after a student has already been awarded financial aid. In both cases, it is critical that the requested information be submitted to the UNC Aid Office as soon as possible.
All undergraduate and graduate students receiving financial aid from the University of North Carolina may be subject to a process known as "verification". Verification is a requirement of the Federal Government whereby you and your parents are asked to verify the accuracy of information submitted on the FAFSA. The majority of verification requests take place after FAFSA data has been transferred to the University but before a student's financial aid has been awarded. Until you and your parents submit complete and accurate verification information, you will not be awarded financial aid.
You will be notified by an email alert sent to the email you have entered at directory.unc.edu when the Office of Scholarships and Student Aid needs additional information. Specific instructions regarding downloadable forms and how to submit the requested information will be available on your online fincial aid information pages available via Student Central. It is your responsibility to obtain, when needed, your aid information and requested forms via Student Central. Instructions on accessing your aid information via Student Central will be provided in the email alert.
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Cost of Attendance - The Cost of Attendance, also known as the "budget," is an estimate of the expenses associated with attending the University for a particular award period. Your cost estimate, which is used in calculating your financial aid eligibility, is based on your program of study and your enrollment assumptions. It is important for you to check the accuracy of your enrollment assumptions shown on your online financial aid information pages and report any changes to the Office of Scholarships and Student Aid. Enrollment information is listed on the Financial Aid Award.
Financial Aid Eligibility - This section provides a calculation of your Financial Need, which is the first figure the Office of Scholarships and Student Aid uses in determining the amount of need-based financial aid for which you are eligible. The financial information you and your family provide on the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) or Renewal FAFSA is analyzed by the Federal Need Analysis Processor using a standard formula established by the U.S. Congress. It is used by the Federal Processor to calculate an expected family contribution (EFC) which is the amount individual students and their families should have the potential to pay for higher education.
After analyzing your financial information, the Federal Processor sends the results to the University of North Carolina (and any other schools you listed on the FAFSA), indicating how much you and your family should be able to pay for your education. If the cost of attendance at UNC-Chapel Hill is greater than what the processor indicates you and your family should be able to pay, the University then considers you to have financial need.
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Once you have met all of the conditions for the disbursement of financial aid, funds from University administered programs and from Stafford and Plus Loan electronic transmissions (or paper checks if your lender cannot provide electronic funds transmission) will be transferred at the start of each semester to your University student account in the Cashier's Office. If your financial aid exceeds your total bill from the Cashier's Office, you will receive a refund check on the first day of classes. We strongly recommend, for timeliness and the convenience of avoiding lines, to set up Direct Deposit with the Cashier's Office. Direct Deposit allows the Cashier's Office to electronically deposit your financial aid refund to your personal checking account. You can use this Direct Deposit form or obtain one from the Cashier's Office website. If you have not arranged for direct deposit, a paper refund check can be picked up at the Cashier's Office in Suite 2215 of SASB North on Ridge Road between the hours of 7:30am through 4:30pm, Monday through Friday beginning the first day of classes.
If your financial aid does not cover the balance of your bill at the Cashier's Office, you will be responsible for covering the difference. Payments can be paid to the Cashier's Office through Student Central, over the phone at 877-962-8621, or by mailing payment to the Cashier's Office.
How to Defer Your Bill - You may receive a bill from the Cashier's Office before financial aid is awarded by the Office of Scholarships and Student Aid. Depending on your financial aid award, a portion of your bill may be covered by financial aid and, therefore, you will be allowed to defer payment until your financial aid is received. Your account with the Cashier's Office will remain in good-standing while financial aid is pending.
If you received financial aid the previous semester, there will likely be a statement on your bill that reads, "We are aware that you are a financial aid applicant. If you do not owe from a previous period and your aid will cover this semester's expense, don't return anything. You must pay any previous balance and any amount not covered by your aid." This means that the Cashier's Office has deferred the amount of your bill for the current semester that will be covered by your financial aid.
If you do not see a statement on your Cashier's bill similar to the one above, simply flip the bill over and find the section, "Tuition, Fees, and Housing Deferment". You should complete this section of the bill and return it to the Cashier's Office with a payment for what is not covered by financial aid and/or charges from a previous period. This will keep bill payment for the current semester deferred until financial aid is received.
Please remember that financial aid only covers the semester for which it is intended; if you owe from a previous semester, you must make other arrangements to pay this portion. Financial aid cannot cover past charges.
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The Financial Aid portlet via Student Central is designed to provide you with accurate and easily accessible information about your financial aid. However, we understand you may occasionally need information beyond that provided in the portlet. For general financial aid information, please visit and search this website where we have provided a great deal of information and links to additional sources of aid information. We encourage you to please try to first resolve your questions using either or both of these online resources. If after doing so you still need assistance with aid information, you may call 919-962-8396 or visit our office in 111 Pettigrew Hall, Monday through Friday, 8am to 5pm. Please remember that techincal problems with accessing either your aid information via Student Central or this website should be reported by visiting help.unc.edu and using the "Submit a Help Request" link to submit a problem ticket, or by calling the UNC Technical Support Help Desk at 919-962-HELP(4357) to report the problem you're having.
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