Paying off Student Loan ideas.

principlecounts

It's been 10 years since I finished university, and in that time I've never looked at my student payments over the last 10 years. So what did I get up to on Friday evening? I ...

- sorted in date order all my payslips from 2006 to my most recent one, August 2016.
- sorted in date order all my P60's since 2006
- cross checked every SLC payment in my payslips with the annual amount on the P60 and with my SLC account.

What I discovered:
- I had only 3 payslips not held on file. I can obtain those.
- HMRC reckons I paid less towards SLC one year, but my payslips actually prove I paid more, about ~£500. I'll put a fix to that.
- I'm about half way through paying off my loan, and from now on keep a sharper record on this.
- I could half the time remaining until I'm student loan free, if I paid a voluntary £100 a month, but the interest rate is currently 2.4%, so I'll be better off putting the money a couple of high interest current accounts, and wait until I accumulate a sizeable amount to potentially finally pay the dam thing off.

Anyone else out there still paying their student loan, and toying with paying it off?

missbiggles1

Why would you want to pay it off earlier than you need?

principlecounts

missbiggles1 wrote: »

Why would you want to pay it off earlier than you need?

To be debt-free! :money: I know Martin's guide doesn't recommend this financially.

missbiggles1

principlecounts wrote: »

To be debt-free! :money: I know Martin's guide doesn't recommend this financially.

You could be made redundant or become ill/disabled tomorrow and not need to pay anything - once you've made repayments, you can't get them back.

Zoology_Dragon

It is tempting to overpay to get rid of it but you can earn more interest than you're paying by putting the money into a savings/current account.

I'm desperate for mine to be gone, it's my only debt (other than mortgage). I still owe ~£10k and, according to the MSE calculator, have about four years left to go. Realistically it will probably take longer though as I'm employed on a contract (three years to go) and there's every chance I'll have a gap before my next contract is lined up.

mvarrier

Very important to cross check your P60 vs SLC statement.

I discovered that one year my wife student loan account received no payment despite 3000 pounds being deducted from her salary that year. This was 2 years after the fact. We were able to rectify (including interest accrued) but I wonder how many people move house etc and miss a statement and never notice these errors!