The IRS Data Retrieval Tool (DRT) allows students and parents who are completing the FAFSA on the Web (and who have already submitted their federal tax return) to retrieve their tax data from the IRS database. All students and parents of dependent students who indicate on the application that they have already filed a federal tax return and who are otherwise eligible to use the DRT will be directed to do so.
Students and parents are strongly encouraged to make use of the DRT (though it is voluntary) because it is accurate, efficient, and useful for verification and corrections. However, the following are a few scenarios in which students and parents are ineligible to use the IRS DRT:
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The student/parent is married, and either the student/parent or his/her spouse filed as Married Filing Separately.
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The student/parent is married, and either the student/parent or his/her spouse filed as Head of Household.
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The parents’ marital status is "Unmarried and both legal parents living together."
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The student/parent filed a Puerto Rican, foreign tax return, or an IRS Form 1040-NR or 1040NR-EZ.
Any students or parents who meet the above criteria will need to manually enter their tax return information.
Additionally, students or parents who filed their tax returns electronically within the last three weeks or through the mail within the last 11 weeks, might need to manually enter their tax return information or return at a later date to transfer their tax return information into the Free Application of Federal Student Aid (FAFSA®) form because their tax return information might not be available for transfer from the data retrieval tool.
https://studentaid.gov/help/irs-drt-eligibility