How to Fill Out and Submit the Income-Driven Repayment Plan Request Form

To complete the Income-Driven Repayment Plan Request Form, log in to StudentAid.gov with your FSA ID, pick one of the three plans currently available, consent to the IRS data exchange that pulls your income, enter your family size and tax filing status, and sign electronically. The online version takes about ten minutes. A paper version is available if you prefer to mail it to your loan servicer. The same form handles first-time enrollment, annual recertification, and mid-year recalculations when your income changes.¹

Which Plans the Form Lets You Choose in 2026

Before you open the application, know your options. A federal court order issued on March 10, 2026, blocked the SAVE plan, and borrowers who had enrolled in or applied for SAVE were placed into forbearance and told to pick a different plan.² The current form offers three:¹

Income-Based Repayment (IBR). Payments are 10 percent of discretionary income with forgiveness after 20 years if your first loan was disbursed on or after July 1, 2014; 15 percent with forgiveness after 25 years if it predates that. The One Big Beautiful Bill Act removed the partial financial hardship requirement, so higher earners who previously did not qualify can now enroll.³
Pay As You Earn (PAYE). Payments are 10 percent of discretionary income with forgiveness after 20 years. Your calculated IDR payment must be less than the standard 10-year payment. PAYE begins phasing out on July 1, 2027; borrowers who leave the plan after that date cannot re-enroll.⁴
Income-Contingent Repayment (ICR). Payments are the lesser of 20 percent of discretionary income or a fixed 12-year payment adjusted for income, with forgiveness after 25 years. ICR is the primary option for borrowers who consolidated Parent PLUS loans.

Loans That Can Go on the Form

Direct Loans are eligible for all three plans without any extra steps. FFEL Program loans qualify only for IBR in their original form; to reach PAYE or ICR, consolidate them into a Direct Consolidation Loan first.⁵ Parent PLUS loans cannot go on any IDR plan in their original form and must be consolidated, with the consolidation completed before July 1, 2026, to preserve IDR access. Allow at least 90 days for consolidation to process, which means starting the application no later than early April 2026. Once consolidated, Parent PLUS borrowers become eligible for ICR first; after making a payment on ICR, they can move to IBR. Taking out any new federal loan on or after July 1, 2026, removes IDR eligibility from all your Parent PLUS loans, including those already consolidated.³ Perkins Loans need to be consolidated to gain access. Private loans are not eligible under any circumstances.

Loans first disbursed on or after July 1, 2026, use the new Repayment Assistance Plan (RAP) instead of the IDR form. If you already hold loans from before that date, you fill out the existing application and choose from the three plans above.⁶

What to Gather Before You Start

Missing information will either stall your application or force your servicer to send it back. Have these ready:

Your FSA ID, needed to log in and sign electronically. If you don’t have one, create it at StudentAid.gov; verification can take up to three days.
Your Social Security number.⁷
Your most recent tax return information. The online application uses the FUTURE Act Direct Data Exchange to pull your AGI and filing status directly from the IRS with your consent, which replaced the old IRS Data Retrieval Tool.⁸
Family size details. Your family size includes you, your spouse (if filing jointly), your children who receive more than half their support from you, and any other dependents living with you who meet the same support test.⁹
Your spouse’s name, SSN, and federal loan details if you file jointly or if your spouse has federal student loans.

If your latest tax return doesn’t reflect your current income because of a job loss, cut hours, or a recent change of employment, submit alternative documentation instead. Recent pay stubs or an employer letter showing gross pay and pay frequency work; the servicer will project an annual figure from them. If you have no taxable income at all, you can certify that on the form, which may produce a calculated payment of zero dollars under IBR, PAYE, or ICR.¹⁰

Filling Out the Form

Reason for Submitting

The form asks whether you are enrolling for the first time, recertifying annually, or requesting a recalculation because your circumstances changed. Pick the correct reason. It determines which supporting documents your servicer expects and how the application is routed internally.

Choosing a Plan

Section 2 asks you to pick a specific plan or check the box that lets your servicer calculate your payment under every plan you qualify for and place you on the one with the lowest monthly cost. If you’re undecided, that “lowest payment” option is a reasonable default. If you’re pursuing Public Service Loan Forgiveness after 120 qualifying payments, any of the three plans counts, and a lower monthly payment leaves a larger balance to be forgiven.¹¹

Filing Status and Spousal Information

How you file taxes with your spouse changes your payment. If you file jointly, your spouse’s income is included in the calculation under all three plans. If you file separately, only your individual income counts for IBR, PAYE, and ICR, which can substantially lower the payment when one spouse earns much more than the other.¹² Filing separately carries tax costs of its own, so compare both scenarios before deciding. The form also asks whether your spouse has federal loans, because that affects payment allocation between you.

Signature

Online, you sign with your FSA ID. On paper, you and your spouse (if applicable) sign in ink. Missing signatures are one of the most common reasons paper applications come back.

Submitting Online

The online application at StudentAid.gov/idr is the fastest route. Most people finish in about ten minutes, and you can save your progress and return.¹ The system walks you through income, family size, filing status, and state of residence. If you consent to the FUTURE Act data exchange, the application pulls your tax information straight from the IRS, so you upload nothing. Before submitting, you can compare your payment under each eligible plan against the standard repayment amount. You sign with your FSA ID and receive an immediate confirmation.

Submitting on Paper

Download the form from StudentAid.gov and fill it out by hand. Section 7 of the form provides a mailing address; if no address is printed there, mail it to your loan servicer directly.⁷ Paper takes longer to process than online. Use a trackable mailing method, since the envelope contains your Social Security number and income records. Before sealing it, confirm every page is included, every required field is complete, and every required signature is present.

What Happens After You Submit

Your servicer generally processes an application within a few weeks.¹³ While it is pending, your servicer places your loans into administrative forbearance for up to 60 days so you don’t fall delinquent. No payments are due during that window, but interest still accrues. If processing runs past 60 days and the forbearance expires, call your servicer right away. Letting the loan slip into delinquency can force you to restart the application.

Once approved, you receive a disclosure statement showing your new monthly payment, its start date, and how interest is handled under your plan. Read it against what you reported. If anything looks off, or if the servicer needs more documents, respond quickly so the forbearance doesn’t lapse before the plan is in place.

Recertifying Each Year

Staying on an IDR plan requires annual recertification. Each year, resubmit your income and family size before your recertification deadline using the same form; just select recertification as your reason for submission. Your servicer should send a reminder, but more than half of borrowers miss the deadline in a given year, so set your own calendar reminder.¹⁴

Missing the deadline hurts twice. Your monthly payment can jump back to the standard repayment amount, and any unpaid interest that had accumulated gets capitalized onto your principal, so you begin accruing interest on a larger balance.¹⁵ In some plans, a missed deadline removes you from the plan entirely. Recertification itself takes the same ten minutes as the initial application if you do it online, and the FUTURE Act data exchange usually means no new documents to gather.

1
Federal Student Aid. Income-Driven Repayment Plan Request
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Federal Student Aid Partners. Federal Student Loan Program Provisions Effective Upon Enactment Under One Big Beautiful Bill Act
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MOHELA Federal Student Aid. Repayment Options
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Federal Student Aid. What to Know About Federal Family Education Loan (FFEL) Program Loans
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PHEAA. One Big Beautiful Bill Act – Paying Back Your Loans
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Federal Student Aid. Income-Driven Repayment Plan Request Form
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U.S. Department of Education. Computer Matching Agreement – FUTURE Act Direct Data Exchange
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eCFR. 34 CFR 685.209 – Income-Driven Repayment Plans
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Federal Student Aid. Income-Driven Repayment Plans
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Federal Student Aid. 4 Things to Know About Marriage and Student Loan Debt
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Office of Evaluation Sciences. Increasing IDR Re-certification Among Student Borrowers
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Federal Student Aid. Interest Capitalization