SLC Overpayment advice needed please

stupidspender

Ok I'm in a bit of a mess and I was wondering if anybody could give me any advice at all?

Situation is I started University last year and then dropped out about a month or so later for personal reasons. Then in January I had a bill come through from my University for my tuition fees, I hadn't yet applied for Student Finance as I'd thought I wouldn't be eligible due to dropping out so quickly.

I then applied for student finance as I thought well if i've got the bill for the tuition fees, I must be eligible for the other support, and so I had payments (Maintenance Loans and Maintenance Grant) which I didn't think I'd have to pay back until earning over 15k a year.

Then this September I applied for finance again as I restarted my course, and the application seemed to be taking a long time to go through so I phoned them up earlier this week and they said it has been blocked at the moment as they're sorting out overpayments I had last year (the full support that was paid). It seems I wasn't eligible for finance as I left university so early, and when I phoned the University to find out what had gone on it turns out they'd put the suspension start date as 2 days after the course started, so I wouldn't be eligible for tuition fees (although I'd already got the bill so assumed I could get student finance).

Now I'm told I could be billed the full amount I received last year before I receive the support I will be eligible for 'this' year.

I'm very worried as I don't have around £5k to pay off the loans and grants i'd assumed I was eligible for, and also, foolishly, i'd assumed the university would have informed the SLC I had suspended attendance on the course, which I know is my mistake.

Will I be expected to pay the £5k off in full before I receive the finance this year or will I be able to make monthly repayments? As I need the student finance from 'this' year to actually repay the overpayments from last year.

Sorry this is such a long query, I'm just very worried about it, any advice given is very much appreciated.

onlypaddy

you'll have to pay it back i think, it doesnt sound like you would have been eligible. you have to actually be a student after all. instead of automatically assuming you were eligible for student finance you would have been better pointing out to the uni that you shouldn't have to pay the full fees since you dropped out. in hindsight they should have realised themselves, but it is not the student loan companies fault.

if they ask for it back you'll have to pay it. whether or not you can make it a monthly payment is up to you to sort out with the SLC.

FatratUK

This is a bad position to be in, sorry.

I had a similar problem. In 2005 i started a course in September, and on the day that i signed up i had a bad stomach problem which ended up being my appendix enflamming. I was in hospital for a few days while they removed it, then was in a bit of a bad way in the following weeks. I fell behind on my work so i decided to drop out as i didn't feel the course was for me and also because i was behind anyway.

This led to me being billed for tuition fees from the uni for half a year's worth of tuition, the SLC also wanted me to repay a grant they had paid me, which i had already used to pay off a previous loan, originally to avoid the interest charges i would have occured.

So come 2008 i decided to go back to uni, and when i applied i still owed a couple of hundred to each of them, and the uni said that they wouldn't let me come back to uni until i paid them off, and the SLC said i'd get no support/loans accepted until i paid them off too.

So, i don't know how much you'll be expected to pay off, but whatever you're asked of, unless you get on a payment plan by luck, you won't be seeing any support loans and might not even be allowed to study at all, if your experience goes the same way as mine.

Personally though, i think you'll be asked to repay the student loan/grant cash and i doubt the uni will ask you for anything for the course.

stupidspender

Well the uni said they were going to write a credit note to the SLC as my leave of absence was recorded as 2 days after the course started, so I wouldn't be liable to pay tuition fees.
If this is the case, do you have any idea if I will be eligible for a tuition fee loan as this will have been paid back to the SLC?
I know I probably wouldn't be able to take out the maintenance loans/grants until these have been paid back in full but the tuition fee loan is my main concern.