Student Loans Company - Overpayment

xeon2012

My partner has just received a relatively threatening letter from 'Smith Lawson Solicitors' suggest the student loans company overpaid her and they are taking the necessary actions to recover the amount.

The SLC have made no attempt to contact her prior to receiving the letter from Smith Lawson. She is now panicking because they are threatening door step collection for a sum of money we just don't have.

What should we do? This seems slightly aggressive for a company acting on behalf the government for a mistake made by the government organisation

fermi

Smith Lawson & Co are NOT solicitors.

They are not even debt collectors.

They are just employees of the student loan company using a fake trading name to try and put the wind up you/her.

What exactly is this overpayment? From when?

xeon2012

fermi wrote: »

Smith Lawson & Co are NOT solicitors.

They are not even debt collectors.

They are just employees of the student loan company using a fake trading name to try and put the wind up you/her.

What exactly is this overpayment? From when?

The sum is for £300, maybe not a lot to most people, but not something we can just 'come up with' if you get me.

This would have been from 2010

fermi

If you agree that it is owed, then just make a payment offer that you can afford. Pay it and keep paying it, whatever silly threats they might come up with.

Hard not to worry when you get letters like these, but just do what you reasonably can and stick to your guns and only pay what you can afford.

Taiko

Out of interest, what makes you believe it's their error? Quite often, going from experience, they are actually errors made by the student.

xeon2012

I have requested they send me details of what has gone wrong

Taiko

I'll hazard two guesses in advance. You mentioned partner, and my first guess would be that you possibly had children. Obviously that may be wrong, but if so, it's likely to come from the childcare grant/parents learning allowance. Those are based on a partners estimated net income for the academic year the application is for, not a previous year. These are then not assessed until the September after the academic year the student applies for.

In with that, if it is applicable, there's a chance that the total cost of childcare was below the figure estimated, and therefore there's an overpayment that way.

Only other guess at this stage would be an early withdrawl from the course. Again, not much is known about whether your partner completed the full course.