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Counter Fraud Department - Student Finance

I've applied to do teacher training in September 2020. All was going well but CFS have stepped in and withdrawn my funding. I had an overpayment of my childcare grant for my third year and they withdrew my last year's tuition but I haven't been able to find a job so haven't made any repayments back. I was in a bad place with my mental health at the time and can't remember any details for the overpayment so I've gone through the letters on my SFE account but there's no reason given for the overpayment.

I spoke with SFE this morning and they've asked for all of the following from 2012-2016:

all bank statements for all accounts
all childcare contracts, receipts and invoices
all council tax statements and bills

Apparently, they sent out a letter in 2015 or 2016 and I should have responded back then. I clearly cannot recall the letter nor can I find it on my SFE account so I've asked for a copy.

Of course this is beyond ridiculous on so many levels. I moved house six times during my degree plus was homeless and Sectioned in those four years too. I don't have any paperwork from a year ago, let alone four years ago and further back. I haven't used childcare since 2016 and, at one point, my son was with two childminders and a pre-school who (I suspect) might not even be operating despite the lockdown, let alone keep paperwork from eight years ago (which is against the DPA). I've also changed bank account multiple times and wouldn't have a clue where to start on getting bank statements. I also moved so many times across two counties and didn't pay council tax (as I was a student!) so no clue about council tax bills.

I've emailed CFS with this information and sent them a recent medical report (which I had for something else) which confirms my mental health issues right back to 2014. I suspect they'll have to drop the case due to lack of evidence (I can't prove my innocence due to lack of paperwork so they can't prove my guilt in whatever it is they're accusing me of) but I guess they won't approve my finance for 20/21 either.

Happy to talk to them and discuss everything but I was an absolute mess back then (recovering from trauma, depressed, anxiety through the roof, in an abusive relationship, homeless, Sectioned and everything else) so it's all a bit of a black hole in my head and I don't even know how I managed my degree, let alone anything else. It's probably all going to sound a bit vague and deflective to say that, but it's the truth. I genuinely don't even know what they're concerned about anyway...

I guess there goes the end of my teaching career before it even started! Anyone else had any similar issues?

Reply 1

NeroliTenzing

Sounds awful what you've gone through, if you've been able to send in medical evidence hopefully this will give you leeway in resolving the issue with them.
The overpayment from what I can work out is likely that if you withdrew before the end date, a portion of your instalments including childcare you won't be entitled to. It may be that you didn't finalise all the childcare forms at the time, so they can't assume you used the money on childcare without them. And it's in the Ts & Cs to keep your address up to date (but I agree, have they never heard of email?)
Perhaps you can call the banks you may have used, they can provide duplicate statements (but may charge for it). Worth checking if your provider is still active, if not perhaps at least you can show the date they ceased trading?
Remember if you're doing some secondary subjects there are bursaries available. And being part way through a PGCE (primary) I swear, make suuuuure you want to be a teacher, because it is an awful course in terms of learning curve and workload. I may be extreme as I had an awful mentor, but during placement I was up at 6 and finishing lesson plans at 12-1am. Happy for lockdown as I have NO idea how I would have managed 10000 words plus another placement.
Keep on top of the work, if you ever have free time do something then and there, never assume you'll have time to do it later. That being said the kids can be lush, but really, from what I've seen in schools, like some of my teacher friends have warned me from the start, is it really worth the stress?
But others on my course have loved it, like I say I was really unlucky.
Don't want to sound too miserable, but there was an element of 'I can get funding for this' that went into my decision, maybe that was my mistake :-) I'm having a rethink on final term in September instead.
I really hope CFS work something out with you!

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