Student finance

Lct5 · 14 April 2022 at 4:25PM

Hi, my daughter decided to leave uni in February, 1st year, and change her course starting at a new uni in September. She had to pay 50% of her tuition fees and rent for spring and summer term. Her flat has been filled and so she is not being charged rent for the summer now. However she has received her student finance for the summer term. Should she pay it back to reduce her loan as she will have to pay back a 4th year because she changed course?
Thank you

kaMelo · 21 April 2022 at 12:43AM

She doesn't have a choice in the matter, any maintenance loan received for a period after she had left her course is an overpayment and repayable in full as soon as possible.
SFE should write to you with a calculation of how much the overpayment is. You/her can then either repay in full, set up a payment plan or, as she is due to start a new course in September, it is more likely any overpayment will be deducted in full from the maintenance loan for her new course.

I'd check whether the University has notified SFE correctly about her finishing date in February, if it had it should have stopped any finance for the summer term. The fact she has received her maintenance loan would also raise doubts in my mind about whether the tuition fee loan was also paid when it shouldn't have been.

kaMelo · 28 April 2022 at 1:31AM

mikemen said:

Your daughter should contact the financial aid office at her new school to find out if she will be responsible for paying back the summer term loan. If she is not required to pay it back, then she does not need to worry about it reducing her loan for the fourth year.

The financial aid office are not responsible for maintenance loans, either in granting or collection. Even if they were they cannot ignore legislation.
Entitlement to maintenance loans ends the day a student leaves their course, any money received to cover a period of time after a student has left their course is an overpayment and repayable in full, outside of the usual deduction from earnings over the threshold. It's not a debatable point, it's the law.