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Gov.uk giving false and misleading information to students applying for loans and their parents – Martin Lewis calls for urgent correction

Assistant Editor – News & Investigations

Created 5 May 2023 | Edited 28 July 2023

"Incorrect and likely misleading" information about maintenance loans in England on Gov.uk could lead to a material number of students not getting the full amount they're entitled to. That's why MoneySavingExpert.com founder Martin Lewis has written to the chief executive of the Student Loans Company – the body responsible for the relevant pages – urging it to fix the errors.

Martin's full letter below explains the issue in detail. For more info on how student finance works, including in Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales, see our Student loans mythbusting guide.

Update: 28 July 2023: Since this story was first published in May, the information on Gov.uk has been corrected, and the Student Loans Company has now also confirmed that it's proactively contacting some current students who may have missed out to let them know about the new guidance. This should hopefully mean more students get the full amount of financial support they're entitled to.

If you're a student (or you're supporting a student), and your household income has dropped recently, see below for full info about the issue and what you need to do.

Read Martin's letter

Below is a copy of the original letter sent on 5 May:

Friday 5 May 2023

Dear Chris Larmer, chief executive of the Student Loans Company,(CC: the right honourable Gillian Keegan MP, secretary of state for education; Baroness Barran MBE, minister for the school system and student finance)

I wanted to write to you concerning incorrect and likely misleading wording on Gov.uk about the current year income assessment for student maintenance loans in England – which allows households who've had a substantial recent drop in income to have it taken into account when the student’s living loan assessment is being decided (meaning the loan will be bigger; a crucial lifeline for many).I have been informed your organisation is responsible for those pages (if not, please let me know). I am aware one of our users already notified you about this two months ago, and had a reply accepting that it was incorrect. We believe this information has been like this for at least two years.

So I am surprised that the error has still not been fixed, and frankly I am writing this open and public email to ask you to urgently escalate it. I also believe it is appropriate you consider how to retrospectively fix it for those who have struggled financially after being misguided.

The incorrect information is here: https://www.gov.uk/support-child-or-partners-student-finance-application/current-year-income (last accessed 5 May 2023). It states:

“You’ll qualify for an assessment if your expected household income after the 15% decrease is between £25,000 and £58,291 a year.

If your household income is more than £58,291 a year but less than £70,040 a year, you may still qualify depending on the student’s circumstances. Check how you’re assessed and paid.

If your total household income is likely to be less than £25,000 a year, you will not be able to get an assessment unless the student needs it to get:

a bursary or scholarship from a university or college
extra student finance for children or dependent adults”

This information is wrong and/or unclear in two places.

“You’ll qualify for an assessment if your expected household income after the 15% decrease is between £25,000 and £58,291 a year.”
I presume the reason for the £25,000 rule is students from households that get less will already be getting the full maintenance loan.
Yet someone could, and likely many would, qualify for a current year income assessment if their household income was less than £25,000 a year after the decrease, if their income was over £25,000 a year in the initial application assessment period. Sudden and substantial drops in income like this are exactly what this rule is meant to help.
"If your total household income is likely to be less than £25,000 a year, you will not be able to get an assessment unless the student needs it to get..."
An applicant could qualify if their household income is likely to be less than £25,000 a year, for example if household income was previously above £25,000 a year in the initial application assessment period.
It would be helpful to clarify that if household income was less than £25,000 a year in the initial application, they would already be receiving the maximum maintenance available, so wouldn’t gain from a current year income assessment.

I note that the Welsh Government avoids this error by making no reference at all to a lower income threshold in its own student finance information.

This incorrect wording will mislead and will have deterred some from applying for this much needed assessment; wrongly assuming they will not qualify.Ultimately, this will have the biggest impact on the most vulnerable households which already may be experiencing cashflow problems during the cost of living crisis, with students from those households potentially missing out on hundreds, or even thousands of pounds of support that they were absolutely entitled to.With student finance application deadlines approaching, this may be the first and only opportunity a student and their household have to receive information that a current year income assessment could be available to them – and it’s particularly concerning that this wrong information is linked to from the application form itself.

Please regard this email as a formal request for this issue to be investigated, so that an immediate correction to the website (and any other communications) can be made and measures put in place to prevent this mistake happening in the future. I would be grateful if you could advise on how quickly this problem will be fixed and I would also like to know what you’ll do for those who have already fallen victim to this misinformation.

Yours sincerely,

Martin Lewis

Founder and chair, MoneySavingExpert

MoneySavingExpert.com and its founder Martin Lewis raised this issue with the Student Loans Company (SLC) on 5 May. Since publishing this story, the Gov.uk page in question has been updated as outlined below (you can also read the changes on Martin's Twitter).

In its formal response to Martin's letter, the Student Loans Company confirmed that the incorrect guidance on Gov.uk had been in place since July 2020.