Maternity Leave and Student Loan Repayments

[TheFantasticFixit]

I'm due to go onto maternity leave at the end of October and was wondering about what happens to Student loan repayments whilst you are on ML. My maternity package is 6 weeks at 90%, and then a further 18 weeks at 50% + SMP before dropping down to SMP only.

My Student loan repayments are taken directly from my salary and I currently pay about £130 a month back to them.

Will the SLC take a repayment during this period? Money is already going to be tight so I am rather hoping not!

Would I need to contact the SLC myself to organise this or would it be done through my employer?

Any advice greatfully received!

Hello,

You won't have to pay your student loan when you move to SMP as you will be below the threshold. Give the SLC a phone and they will send you the paperwork.

thanks Wakarimasen; does that mean though that I will still pay it whilst on the 90 and 50% pay?

The SLC will have a threshold at which point you will be able to defer payments, so it depends whether your 90 and 50% pay will take you above that threshold or not IYSWIM? You will be able to call SLC and find out what the threshold is. HTH!

It should all be automatic like tax, shouldn't it? I didn't think you had to call them up, the PAYE system should sort it automatically and reduce payments as your pay reduces.

I'm on ML at the moment, and as soon as my pay dropped below a certain amount the payments just stopped.

I called them this morning to ask this very question :)

The threshold is £1,260 (around that anyway) gross pay per month, below which you'll not have repayments. Anything above that is what you would pay a proportionate amount on. They didn't mention any paperwork as it's all done through the inland revenue who notify them when your pay drops below a certain level.
Given that the interest carries on accruing I might put money aside and make an overpayment at some point - just so the damn thing doesn't grow at least!

My work said that it's all automatic. The SLC take 9% of everything that you earn over £15k annually (that was the threshold when I graduated in 2007 it might have changed I'm not sure) so it depends on how much you'll earn in the financial year.

Ah thanks everyone - was away for a couple of days so couldn't reply but thanks so much for being so helpful. I knew I was being too hopeful that they would 'forget' about it for my ML!