…to tell you that you could get a refund of your student loan repayments?

[Thewonderofyouth]

Of course I know I’m not being unreasonable, I just want to reach as wide an audience as possible so posting for traffic.

So, firstly, I’m not the first to post about this but I’ve searched for the past thread where originally I gleaned this little nugget from but can’t find it 🫤 kudos though to the original OP!

Basically, if, like me, you’ve been on maternity leave (or changed jobs, had a break in employment, or your income has reduced for any other reason) in the last 12 months today is the start of a new tax year and so it’s worthwhile giving SLC a call to find out if you’re entitled to your loan repayments back. Or, actually, if you’ve ever had any of the above changes to your circumstances since you began repaying your student loan then they call also check previous tax years too so please call them!

As with anything, there are some caveats; your total income for the year would have to be below the relevant threshold for your loan T&Cs and any amount refunded will be added back to your loan balance, but it’s worth a 5-10 minute call to find out if you’re owed anything.

Here’s a link to the relevant gov.uk page with contact details, and also the MSE’s take on it too, both of which will explain it far better than I can…

But yeah, give them a call in the morning! Even if you’re not sure if you might’ve ever overpaid it’ll cost you nothing to enquire. I did it today* and I’m going to be getting just shy of £600 back which is very much needed right now!

*I also called last year when I first read about this on here and got about £50 back for a previous tax year too.

Thanks for reading, and please also share this information with anyone else that it might be relevant to ☺️

I’ve done this in the past and got quite a bit back

Ah fantastic, pleased to hear it!

I'm reading about this now and am thinking I may be eligible for a refund though don't want to get my hopes up too much one of the years I was on mat leave. How easy is it in practice do you just call up and say you think you've been overpaying because xyz and they sort it all out? Or do you have to have specific figures etc?

any amount refunded will be added back to your loan balance

Then what's the benefit? If at some point you'll just be paying back the exact same money again, but with additional interest added. Seems a bit like short term gain for long term pain?

No, you don’t need to prepare any information yourself at all. Assuming you don’t have your loan reference number they can locate your details with your NI Number 👍 when I spoke to them today the call handler said they were expecting a lot of calls about this very thing so don’t worry, they’ll guide you through it! X

Yeah, totally valid question. For me, I attended uni after 2012 for my loan is circa £40000 and growing due to rates. In all likelihood the loan will be forgiven rather than repaid (not least because I’ll only be working part time for the foreseeable due to childcare) so I’d rather have the money back.

Agree with PP, it makes no sense to claim them back.

I saw this and tried to get a refund as I overpaid last year due to being paid different amounts every month (cost of living lump sum). They have told me I can't get a refund as my income was over the minimum threshold and they'll just take it as over payment. I'm so annoyed about but there's nothing I can do.

I am on plan 4 and the repayment income threshold is £25k, last year I earned £25,280 and paid £190 in student loan payments. So effectively student loans company took 70% of my income over the threshold. Repayments are only supposed to be 9% of earning over the repayment threshold but I've paid 70%. It meant I didn't get to keep any of my cost of living payment after tax, NI and student loan.

Excellent!

It does if you'll be paying for your entire career anyway.

It does if a) you're skint now and/or b) it won't be paid back ever anyway.

Thankyou, will try tomw

Shit, that must be so frustrating! I’m sorry. Is there any way you can appeal
the decision or have it looked at as an exception?

The majority of people never repay their student loan in this entirety, so yes, it does make sense to get the money back. It essentially functions like an extra tax.

This new MN feature that suggests similar threads has actually just found the original post I was on about so it’s here if anyone fancies a read…

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/_chat/4476991-student-loan-refund

Lots of success stories for those that called last year 😁

I requested it over Twitter and got a nice refund from a few years ago when I was on mat leave!

I did this a couple of years ago but they asked me to ring back in the July as HMRC have to send them some figures or something.

Yeah, another good point! Sorry, definitely not meaning to drip feed, just an honest oversight. So, when I called today they didn’t already have my confirmed figures for the most recent tax year because it’s literally just ended. They’ve sent off a request to HMRC for it but as I knew the figures from the HMRC gateway app (and it’s below the threshold) the person I spoke with confirmed the amount I’m owed and took my bank account details. As soon as they have the amounts back from HMRC, they’ll process the refund.