Just politeness, I guess. I don’t want to actively point out that I think they can’t do their job correctly. “Did you make a mistake?” comes across as being accusatory and makes the person defensive and possibly less likely to help you, or more likely to actively look for a mistake and reduce the amount. “Can you please help explain to me...?” comes across as being less abrasive/aggressive. Also, given that a computer system takes all the inputs and calculates the amount, a mistake is highly unlikely.
I’m a bit concerned that your husband feels that loan money can be spent on his wants/needs. He does understand OSAP is designed to cover education-associated costs, right? And that it has to be paid back? So it’s technically not even your money? If you’re concerned, maybe stick it in a 30 or 90 day GIC to prevent him from being able to access the money?
For scholarships, when I was at Western, I started with the university’s financial aid website and applied for all in-house scholarships for which I qualified. They had a link to external scholarships, and I followed that link and applied for all external scholarships. I also checked my school email regularly for scholarship announcements. That’s how I ended up with 3-Year scholarship worth $6000, because no one else checked their email and/or applied.
You can also Google “scholarships” and “Canada” or “Ontario”, and whatever special circumstances you have, for example...
“Scholarship Canada foster care”
“Scholarship Canada physical disability”
“Scholarship Canada deaf” (I not saying you’re deaf, it’s just I don’t know exactly what disability you have, so I’m just using it as an example)
“Scholarship Canada mature student”
“Scholarship Canada [your major]”
I googled “Canada scholarships” and the first site listed is
www.scholarshipscanada.com. There are several of these sites around. People love to help people who “pulled themselves up by their bootstraps.”
You can also check individual company websites. Usually Fortune 500 companies have some kind of scholarship program but that’s a lot of work. It’s easier and probably a better use of time to just through the aggregate sites — the sites that compile all that info into one site.
Oh yes, and the library will also have big books of companies that offer scholarships and application information. Eg, “Scholarships, grants, and prizes 2018” and “Ontario Scholarships - 2018 edition” both turned up on an Amazon.ca search. I wouldn’t buy the books - I would first see if the library has copies.