529 Plans / College Savings Plans / Americorps

529 and College Savings Plans

Each College Savings Plan and 529 Plan requires varying information from the account holder regarding funds disbursement. Contact your individual plan to determine what information is required.

Also note some plans may request documentation of billed charges. This information may be found on the student account inquiry page. If needed, the official "Cost of Attendance" (calculated by the Office of Financial Aid)  can be found here: Cost of Attendance

Please make sure checks/additional documentation issued from the college savings plan include the student's name and UID number (9 digit number starting with 1).

Any specific questions related to your actual 529 plan should be directed to your plan provider.  Questions regarding outside or private scholarship payments to the university can be directed to billtalk@umd.edu.

Please ensure you have requested a payment from the provider enough in advance to ensure we have received the funds prior to you bill due date.  Once the school receives a payment it will typically take at least 3 business days for it to be posted and be visible on the student account.  

 

Payments:

Many 529 College Savings Plans now have a digital distribution option which saves time and improves transparency with real-time payment tracking.  When requesting a withdrawal from your plan, look to see if a digital disbursement is available. If your 529 plan provider offers a digital/electronic payment option, we recommend that you choose this method rather than a mailed paper check. The electronic method is significantly faster and ensures the funds are routed to the correct office within the University. 

If a digital distribution is not available within your plan and a mailed check is your only option: Please include your UID on the check and have sent to. University of Maryland - Student Financial Services, 1109 Lee Building, 7809 Regents Dr., College Park, MD 20742

 

 

AmeriCorps

AmeriCorps Segal Education benefits are eligible for use towards your education costs at UMD. To process your benefits, you must first be a registered student at UMD for the term in which you are requesting funds.

A new student enrolled for the Fall 2022 term can request an award for the Fall of 22 term. However, you cannot request funding for any previous semester where there was not registration for an active course load at UMD.

 

How do I apply to use my AmeriCorps benefits at UMD?

 

What happens after I submit a request?

  • Once submitted, our office will review and certify our needed portion of the request within the AmeriCorps portal.  This review and certification process typically takes 1-2 weeks from the time we see your submitted information to Americorps.

Once approval has been certified by our office, we then again must wait for AmeriCorps to process the completed request and actually send funds to the university on your behalf. You will not see any processed payment on your student account until the actual receipt of monies has been transferred to the University.  This secondary portion of the process takes additional time beyond the 1-2 week initial processing period for UMD to certify the award to Americorps

 

Why do I only see payment from Americorps for half of what I was expecting?  

  • AmeriCorps typically disburses funds in two halves with the first half at the beginning of the term and the second half later. If you only see half of the requested funds at first that is normal. You should see that second half later in the term once it has actually been received.

We do recommend regularly reviewing your account (billpay.umd.edu/inquiry) to see activity and what has been processed.

 

What about my bill due date?

  • If you are being funded an amount that only partially covers your tuition and fees, you must resolve the uncovered portion no later than the stated bill due date to avoid late fees and a potential account hold.

If AmeriCorps is covering all of your outstanding university balance, but will be funded after the bill due date, then any late fees that were assessed from missing the due date will be reversed once those Americorps funds are received. Late fees for portions of your bill not covered by Americorps will stand and be due, so it is the student responsibility to ensure what portion of the bill is their liability (if any).

Any late fee or penalty assessment questions can be directed to billtalk@umd.edu

 

 

 

Important Note: The above process is separate from paying off campus Perkins loans.  For information on Perkins, please see: billpay.umd.edu/perkins