Losing home student status

[Movingon2023]

I have been troubled by this the whole weekend and hope the wise mumsneters can make me see some perspectives..

We are a family of 4. Me and dh originally from an Asia country but have lived here for 20+ years under the indefinite leave to remain (ILR) status. In fact our entire working life is in the UK. Our children are born here and have dual nationalities (our home country and British)

Dh's company is looking to expand into Asia and he is offered a post in our home country! We are at the final stages of negotiation and planning. All seems good, we get to be closer to our wider families, kids learn more about their roots. Dc1 is nearly secondary school age. The plan is for the kids to come back here for university then decide for themselves where they want to settle, UK or home country.

All seems good, until I found out that the children will lose their home student status when they come back for uni. It means we suddenly have to find another £180k to make up the shortfall for 2 children (using Oxford uni fees for calculation) . Apparently we need to be ordinary resident in the UK for 3 years prior to uni in order to qualify. Apparently a lot of expats are caught out and end up having to pay international fees. I know rules is rules but it still seems unfair when we have paid tens of thousands of tax every year for 20 years.

The purpose of this thread is to see if there is anyone in the similar situation and how things turn out for you. Also I am hoping if there is anyone working in the student admission/fees department who can shed some light on how I can increase my dc chances of retaining that home student status.

I have read carefully into the rules and all websites say in case of any dispute, it is judged case by case. The following are some of the factors they look at:

1. Property in the uk: we have a couples, which will be rented out
2. Paying UK tax: nothing after we move to asia, expect council tax for the rental house

3..history in the uk: as mentioned, we lived here for 20+ years

1. Ties in the uk: no family nor relatives in the UK
2. Frequent trip back to the uk: we intend to visit once a year
3. Fixed term job posting: dh's company can word it clearly in the contract that the job oversea (I.e. my home country) is fixed term, says 7 years.
4. Having only work visa in the country of the job post, so as to emphasise that the only place we can go after the job finishes, is back to the UK: unfortunately, we don't need a work visa to work in our home country , also there is no restriction to stay back after the expat job finishes.

I think that is all. Sorry it is such a long post. Thank you in advance ☺

Living in Asia with kids in their late teens, my anecdotal experience is that it is a mixed bag - some Unis apply the rules very rigidly, while others are more relaxed. I've got a friend with two kids at different Unis back in the UK, one on international fees and one on home fees. And over the years of discussing this point, no one has a clear answer regarding when it applies and when it doesn't. In reality, it seems to be something of a lottery.

However, if you move your kids to Asia and especially put them in an international school, don't be surprised if they want to consider other options at Uni. You are opening their eyes to a great many opportunities. DS currently has three different countries in his sights, including the UK - the financial differences of his options is just one factor in where he'll decide to go in the end - all be it a big one!

And finally moving kids as late teens can be challenging, some will thrive but frankly some will also struggle and its hard to predict. So if you are looking to come back after 4 years bear in mind one or other of the DC may struggle and you need to factor in how that may impact their end results.

@BillaBongGirl thank you! I didn't know this. For point 2, do parents have to be British? Our home country does not allow dual nationalities, if we convert to British, we need to give up our home country nationalities. But dh's new job needs him to be of local nationality. Do you have a link for the info you posted please? Tia

Two of my sons have worked in Asian counties for the last 7 years. Born and lived in UK until their 20s so full British passports. UK parents still live and work here and own property etc. They would not qualify as home students until they had lived here for three years. I also work at a university and I am familiar with the regulations. There is no way around these rules nowadays. Both ended up doing on line Masters from international universities instead.

If the new job isn't offering him a visa then it isn't an expat job

It's not the uni you need to convince either. You need to convince the student loans company. It does sometimes happen that a uni accepts that a student is ordinarily resident in the UK, but the SLC doesn't and the student then cannot access fee or maintenance loans.

This happened to me in the mid 90s but overseas fees were much less then. I am British and have a British parent but I went to boarding school for A-levels. At the amounts you need for your older child (assuming that you return by the time that dc2 is GCSE age), you might want to consider countries other than the UK and your home country. European universities for instance have degrees taught in English and very affordable

We were in this situation as we lived in China for 12 years and were still living there when ds applied for university. Ds had never lived in the uk, we had no house there and didn’t visit for over 10 years but ds did get home fees status. This was solely down to dh’s contract which stated he was still a uk employee and on secondment in China. The university did want to see a copy of all dh’s contracts to confirm employee status.

How do your DC have dual nationality with home country and U.K. if it’s not allowed?

Can one of you get British citizenship? Say you while your DH stay in ILR status? I think that helps as it shows intent to make U.K. your permanent home.

I don’t have a link, I’m going by lived experience of my family as we are multi-National and use an immigration solicitor (a lot!)

If you PM me, I can send you our Immigration Solicitor company name and contact info. They are really good small business and deal with multinational families with dual/multi nationalities all the time. They specialise in Africa/Asia.

@titchy apology for my ignorance on what expat means 😔 . I thought it simply means the employee is being posted to another country on a fixed term contract. We are not expecting student loan, just home fees status is good enough.

@BillaBongGirl the children can have dual nationalities until they are 21, at which point they have to choose 1.
I need to work out how to pm you. Thank you!

Even as home students the fees they would pay would be much higher than the best Asian universities. Look at this dispassionately.

If you weren't going to use SLC for fee and maintenance loans then the difference between home and international fee status isn't going to cost anywhere near £180k. The cost will simply be the difference between home and international fees - maybe £10k a year, so £30k per child.

@ShanghaiDiva 12 years, that's impressive. Did all the uni you applied offer home student fees?

I took this as consent to PM you and have done so.

@titchy take engineering from Oxford uni as an example, home fee 9250, international fee close to 38k.. that is 30k per year per kid. So 180k for 2 kids

They will be paying UK tax. They will be paying it on their rental income in the UK.
Also, be careful what you wish for. Unis are underfunded, many of them are near bankruptcy. The answer is not to take in more higher paying overseas students - because (alongside home student number caps) that will rapidly result in UK students finding it increasingly difficult to get places. As is already being suggested is happening in Scotland.

@SOWK do you know anymore about the ordinary residence thing other than what’s in your link? Dd is going to Europe au pairing for 18 months, she will be a registered resident on a long term visa. Full uk passport, parents and until next week will have lived in the uk all her life. Will she lose her ordinary residence status?

Completing a Self Assessment doesn't mean you are resident for tax purposes.

You'll probably do self assessment showing UK income only as a non resident - that's your rental income and other UK income, maybe interest on savings and claiming you are non resident by filling out that page of the return.

If you don't hit all the non resident criteria you'd fill out the SA, including all of your worldwide income.

Most unis don't charge Oxford level fees though. Sheffield, Bristol etc charge around £25k for engineering, so an extra £15k. Less if they choose a cheaper subject at a different uni. Law at Royal Holloway for example is £19k for international.

Plus your domicile needs to be considered. You should ask for advice as foreign aspects are complicated.

Actually OP, this whole scenarios is why, when my DH was offered a role in Singapore (5 years only) and us with DDs at secondary, we chose that I would stay home with DDs to continue their education here and visit DH as often as possible (every school holiday in fact), he came to the UK for work too sometimes. Wouldn’t suit everyone of course, but as we knew it was only for 5 years we decided we could manage it as anything else would have screwed too much with DDs continuing secondary education and then Uni.

You can be ordinarily resident in the U.K. without actually living in the U.K.

It is possible - get proper advice rather than posters on Mumsnet!

You are picking an extremely expensive course from an extremely prestigious university. In terms of the extra cost in fees you've catastrophised.

I would be much more concerned about losing your ILR. This is where you need paid for, professional advice because I'm not sure one holiday a year in the UK will cut the mustard for you here. The fact you'll have a 7 year employer contract in my opinion would go against you, it's proving that you only ever intend to holiday in the UK for the next 7 years rather than return to settle.

Well you need to be living in the U.K. on a habitual basis for long or short durations with absences being of a temporary nature. So if a student is here during term time and then habitually every summer holiday too…that’s likely ordinarily resident here.

For OP, as it’s her DH that’s working, she can be here every summer with her DC and then visiting them for a couple weeks each term. They can all be in Asia for Christmas and term breaks.

Im just guessing at a possibility, an immigration solicitor would know the best set up that shows ordinary residence in U.K. even if they also ordinary resident in Asian country too (you can be ordinarily resident in more than one place. It’s about habit and about you have to be in U.K. not just for FT education but for time just living)

You can’t be ordinarily resident here and not be living here at all.

OP just wants to follow the rules, she’s not trying to defraud anyone. Her DC are British, she’s only asking for knowledge that most DC of military and foreign office kids get gratis from their parents employers.

@Judashascomeintosomemoney may be the last resort but I really hope we don't have to do that. 😌.
@NopeNopeNoper I have emailed a few organisations but no reply yet. No harm listening to others' experience here. I think it has proved useful.