Updating Federal Work Study Disbursements For FISAP

Context

This article documents the process for updating Federal Work Study (FWS) disbursement amounts in the QA PeopleSoft environment. It explains how to reconcile with actual using system queries, prepare external award CSV files, and run the external award load process. There are many ways to approach this process, but this article describes the method used to prepare the 2026–2027 form.

Steps

  1. Rosina reviewed the FWS earnings and emailed the system analyst to let them know FWS is ready to be uploaded into the QA PeopleSoft environment. She attached an Excel file with student IDs, the funded amount, and the amount to be loaded. The file had two tabs: one for work study earnings and one for tutoring earnings. On the work study tab, the funding amount was 75% of the loaded value (funding ÷ .75 = loaded). On the tutoring tab, the funding amount matched the loaded value.
     
  2. I ran the UDSFS_FISAP_FWS_DISB query to identify what QA currently had listed as disbursed funds and saved the output to an Excel file. 
     
  3. Now that I know the values we want (from Rosina’s Excel sheet) and what we are currently reporting (from the query), we can use external awards to update the FWS disbursed amount in QA. Since there was only one student on the tutoring tab and their expected value already matched the current value, no update was needed. If it had not matched, I could repeat the following steps for the tutoring students (item type: 000008083470). The expected and current values for the work study students did not match, so they needed to be updated. 
     
  4. To update the disbursement amount, I planned to run two CSV files through external award file processing. I chose two files because I prefer to run the fall-only item type and the spring-only item type separately. This method assumes that Rosina’s Excel file includes all the student IDs from the query in step 2. To confirm, I compare the query IDs to Rosina’s sheet using a quick match or VLOOKUP formula. 
     
  5. The next step is to prepare the first CSV file for the fall-only item type. Open Excel and create a new CSV with six columns: Student ID, Term, Item Type, Disbursed Amount, Offer Amount, and Split Code. You don’t need a header row, so start entering data on the first row. Copy all student IDs from the first tab of Rosina’s Excel sheet into the first column. Use the correct fall term (e.g., 2XX8) in the second column and copy it for each ID. In the third column, enter the item type 000008081469 for each ID. For the fourth column, copy the loaded amount values from Rosina’s sheet. Enter 1000 in the fifth column and FO in the sixth column for each row. Your output should look like the example below: 



    Save the file, and make sure to pick an easy-to-remember file name, as we will need it later.
     
  6. The first file will represent the full-year disbursement, even though it is a fall-only award. Since FISAP reports FWS on an aid-year basis, there’s no need to split the amount between fall and spring. However, our query from step 2 shows some students with spring-only FWS item types that already have disbursements. Because the first file represents the full-year amount in fall, I need to zero out any students who currently have spring disbursements in QA. We can create a second CSV with the same layout as the first. Filter the query from step 2 for SO awards and copy those IDs into column 1 of the new CSV. Enter the correct spring term (e.g., 2XX3) in column 2 and item type 000008083469 in column 3. Columns 4 and 5 should both be 0, and column 6 should be SO. Your output should look like the example below:



    Save the file, and make sure to pick an easy-to-remember file name that is different from the one chosen for the first CSV file.
     
  7. Now that both files are ready we need to use the custom file load utility to upload our files to the network. In PeopleSoft navigate to Menu > UDel Customizations > UD File Load Utility. Once the page refreshes you will be given the option to upload a file. Upload the 2 csv files we created.
     
  8. We are ready to begin the external load process. Ensure you are still in the QA environment, then navigate to Menu > Financial Aid > Awards > External Awards > Process External Award File. The run control I use is FISAP_FWS_EXT_AWARD. At the bottom of the run control you will need to update the file path for the name of the first csv file. (e.g. /opt/home/psoft/saqa/data_ud/YOURFILENAME.csv) Make sure to also update the aid year as necessary. Select Run.
     
  9. You can view if the csv processed successfully by navigating to Menu > Financial Aid > Awards > External Awards > View Data File Staging Results. Enter in the aid year and search. Typically it will be the first result in the search. Make sure to copy the transaction number from this screen. If it has process as expected, we can move to the next step.
     
  10. Next we need to navigate to Menu > Financial Aid > Awards > External Awards > Load External Awards. The run control I use is FISAP_FWS_EXT_LOAD. Update the aid year as needed, adjust the status to unprocessed, and update the transaction number with the number we copied from step 9. Select Run.
     
  11. We can check on the success of the file load by navigating to Menu > Financial Aid > Awards > External Awards > External Award Load Summary
     
  12. Repeat steps 8 - 11 to process our spring only csv file.
     
  13. We can re run our query from step 2 or generate a FISAP report (Menu > Financial Aid > Fund Management > Generate FISAP Reports > FISAP Report 20XX - 20XX) and compare it to Rosina's initial spreadsheet to audit our results.
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