Can I fight Student Loans repayment increase? (overseas)

missjessjones

Hello folks,

Help!

I am a British expat living in Washington, DC. I am one of the few Brits living abroad that actually bothered to notify the Student Loans Company that I was leaving the country, so each autumn for the past 3 years I have filled out an overseas income assessment form and the SLC have set a monthly repayment for me to make manually.

Just after my last assessment I moved from Florida to DC for a new job. With the job came what was, on paper, a 31% pay increase, but with the cost of living so high in Washington I'm actually worse off than before

Anyway, I submitted my payslips to the SLC for assessment. They increased my monthly payment from £8/month to £83/month. That's a 1035% increase!!

I do not make a lot of money and quite frankly I cannot afford this. Is there any way I can fight it? I called the SLC and was told the only thing I could do to appeal was resubmit my income assessment, which I am doing along with cost of living comparisons and a strongly worded letter about how outrageous that kind of an increase is. Is there anything else I can do?

I simply can't afford those payments and I am going to be completely stuffed if I have to keep making them at that level

Any advice appreciated!!

nimbo

missjessjones wrote: »

Hello folks,

Anyway, I submitted my payslips to the SLC for assessment. They increased my monthly payment from £8/month to £83/month. That's a 1035% increase!!

I do not make a lot of money and quite frankly I cannot afford this. Is there any way I can fight it? I called the SLC and was told the only thing I could do to appeal was resubmit my income assessment, which I am doing along with cost of living comparisons and a strongly worded letter about how outrageous that kind of an increase is. Is there anything else I can do?

I simply can't afford those payments and I am going to be completely stuffed if I have to keep making them at that level

Any advice appreciated!!

the SLC don't take into account the cost of living in the UK, so when I was working in London, and then Barnsley the different costs of rent etc. weren't taken into account..

I don't think they'll do it for students overseas will they?

Good luck. (and let us know if they do, I'm intrigued)...

missjessjones

Yeah I'll agree it's a long shot but it's got to be worth a punt. It still doesn't explain why it went up so much in the first place. I nearly fell over when I got the letter :mad:

Bluebonnie

As I recall, the repayments are calculated according to the following rule:
Nil on gross income up to and including £15,000
9% of gross income above £15,000

As your payment has increased by £75 per month, it sounds as if your gross income has increased by the equivalent of £((75/0.09)*12), or £10,000 a year.

Your previous repayment level was very low, suggesting an income only just above the £15,000 threshold, or that you had started to earn part way through the financial year.

It would be surprising if the SLC agreed to vary the repayments on the grounds of hardship, but you could try.

If you had an early student loan, conditions might be different, but am assuming you took it out from about 2005 onwards.

Let us know how you get on.