Students: Loans

(asked on 2nd September 2016) - View Source

Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how many people who have already repaid their student loan in full are having loan repayments deducted from their pay.


This question was answered on 20th September 2016

The Student Loans Company (SLC) administers student loans for each of the UK Government Administrations. It collected £1.79 billion in the 2015-16 financial year in repayments on loans made in England. Statistics covering English loan borrowers are published annually by the SLC in the Statistical First Release (SFR) ‘Student Loans in England’: http://www.slc.co.uk/official-statistics/full-catalogue-of-official-statistics/student-loans-debt-and-repayment.aspx

Information on the value of English loan over-repayments that have been refunded by the SLC in each financial year can be found in Table 1 of the SFR.

Latest management information (as at April 2016) from the SLC shows that, in the tax year 2014-15, there were 66,100 English domiciled borrowers who had over-repaid their loans through PAYE tax collection.

The SLC informs borrowers who are within two years of completing repaying their loans that they may opt to make loan repayments by direct debit, rather than through the tax system.

Borrowers who take up the option to repay by direct debit will not over-repay their loans. If borrowers choose not to repay by direct debit, it is possible that they may over repay, as the SLC receives details of repayments made by borrowers from HMRC on an annual basis. We would encourage more borrowers to take up the direct debit option when they are near to the end of their loans.

Where borrowers have over-repaid, the SLC will contact them to tell them that they have a refund due and make arrangements to pay the money back to them. Any borrower who has over repaid can also contact the SLC at any point to have the money refunded to them.

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