Student Loan (old style) deferment - help!

mc33033

Giraffe01 wrote: »

However, this year the student loan deferment threshold has dropped from £27,070 (2009/2010) to £26,449 (2010/2011) and combined with my small payrise has left me earning £18 per month above the deferment threshold for 2011. The repayments come to £160 per month which I just cannot afford.
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Hi Giraffe and others, I think the way forward is to investigate the goverments cycle to work scheme, read following PDF:

http://www.dft.gov.uk/pgr/sustainable/cycling/cycletoworkguidance/pdf/518054/

Under this scheme you agree to give up part of your salary - not a deduction or a charge, but a LOWER salary in return for hiring a bike from your employer. You can get a bike and accessories up to a £1000 easily enough to get under your £18/month threshold! This is of course easier to implement if you work for an employer who knows about this scheme and is willing to work with you, http://www.cyclescheme.co.uk/ has further details. Let us know how you get on. Hope this helps.

Keyzes

i too am in the same boat.... after promptly gathering my last 3 months payslips as usual to find i was 46£ over the limit! last year i was paniced as i was 4£ under!!!

So in response to mc33033.. Cycling to work isnt exactly helpful when you work 15 miles from your place of work through the country. its 40 mins by, over 2hrs by bus (with 30 min walk the other end). So i need my car... incidental is also screaming out for work!

All of which i just cant afford. And reading your posts here has just confirmed that the SLC arent going to help me.

Thanks to all who posted.

Sherispink

Hi there, does anyone know the new threshold for 2011/12?

I am terrified i will not be able to afford it, should i come in under the threshold, as when i called SLC before i moved into my rented flat and worked out my budget they told it it will never go down! and i got the shock of my life when it did, i came in under this year gone, but am trying to find out what will happen next year? I too am happy to pay the debt back, but my debt plan, was to start paying in 2013, when i will have the funds available.

learbird

There are ways and means around this. If the company you work for has a salary sacrifice scheme for benefits such as pension, child care vouchers or even cycle to work, where payments towards these are deducted from your salary BEFORE tax, this brings the amount you earn ie your TOTAL salary down.

I have been successfully deferring my student loan repayments for the last few years on this basis even though my total salary is several thousand pounds over the threshold amount.

There's a pension crisis in the UK as we all know, and IMO its far better to be saving for the future than paying off the past.

(Its also worth knowing that this debt is wiped after 25 years).

nix_2

Well it's been a while since I posted on this thread. Within a week of posting my predicament, my employer went on an efficiency drive and asked anyone if they wanted to reduce their hours by half a day a week for a year. This was ideal for me so I took the offer which started in June 2011. I had paid 3 loan payments and then requested a deferment form.

Because I didn't have 3 payslips, I sent a letter from my employer. However, SLC didn't get back to me for some time. So I simply cancelled my direct debit. They then contacted me within 3 days after that! They refused to accept deferment until I had 3 wage slips. When I asked them if I pay the loan for this time, would it be reimbursed. They said probably not!! Well that got my back up as they seem to just want to bully people and take money from them when they know that person is now under the threshold. I sent a very strong letter to them, stating all the facts, dates when my new salary came into being and said if they want money from me which they are not entitled to, then I will deal with them through a solicitor.

Within a week I got a letter saying my deferment was successful. I think they just try it on and hope the person just backs down. When you know you're in the right and shouldn't be paying, a threat of getting legal help seems to panic them.

Anyway, my employer now has asked if I want to go back to full hours on my original salary. Having worked it out I go well under the threshold again as they now state its back up to £27,734 so I have a cushion of about £60 now.

What's more difficult now is going back up to a full week after having every other Friday off work!

Cornholio_2

I know this is an older thread I've dug up, but can anyone advise if the student loan has to be paid because say one or two months payslips are over the threshold? I took a new job last April, £24k, more than my last job and still under the repayment threshold. But since November I've been expected to do alternate Sunday overtime, at double time which is putting my current monthly well over the limit. But my P60 will not be near the annual limit by the end of the financial year. If I have to start paying it means one of the two Sundays I work per month is for nothing really, and he's about to start someone else so the OT will end anyway- we're understaffed hence the OT.
My boss is being a bit of a d*ck about this. I'm considering asking him to reduce my Sunday rate to time and a half as this means keeping it below the threshold(£18 an hour is ok by me!). Surely he can't refuse this request if it's saving the company money?
Unlike others I really don't want to pay mine back, and in 6 years time I'll be 50 and it will be written off....
BTW, when I went for the job I wasn't told about this "compulsory" overtime to meet production targets, and I'd rather not do any OT at all, a one day weekend sucks....