Student Finance application & Parent's redundancy

I need some advice regarding student finance for our daughter who will be applying for academic year 24/25. I was made redundant at the end of tax year 22/23 and so aside from my lump sum payment (which was sizeable) we will be reliant on my Wifes relatively low salary, before I need to begin drawing on some of my retirement pensions. From the odd post I've read on here I understand that the student loan is calculated against the tax figures from 2 years preceding the academic year ? If that is still the case then that would mean that for her first academic year 24/25 you would need to reference tax year 22/23 (in which I received the redundancy payment) ?

Having said that, I also saw another post on Student rooms from around 10 years ago in which someone mentioned that the SF package normally depends on actual family income in the tax year before the start of the appropriate academic year but then went onto mention that if circumstances change then you can apply to have your package based on current year income instead ? Does this still apply or is it now based solely on family income in the tax year 2 years before the start of the academic year ?

Hi Paul,

You are correct we would ask for the tax information 2 years behind the academic year. So if the academic year is 2024/25 then it would be the tax year 2022/23. You would need to submit this information however if the household income will drop by 15% or more in the current tax year then you can also apply for Current Year Income.

Thanks, Drew

Thank you for your reply. With regards to your last point below.. "You would need to submit this information however if the household income will drop by 15% or more in the current tax year then you can also apply for Current Year Income"

In March '23, when I was made redundant, our combined income fell by approx 80%. However, based on the above, I'm assuming that in order to "qualify" to apply for Current Year Income, my wife would either need to lose her job this year or have her salary reduced by -> 85%, which, given that we've already seen our combined salary reduced by 80%, seems slightly stringent and inflexible? 🤔Going forward I'm assuming that should our financial circumstances remain the same then when applying for student loan application for academic years 2 & 3 (25/26 and 26/27) then we would be entitled to receive the maximum student finance loan for our daughter ?

Hi Paul,

The household income would only need to drop by 15% or more for one of the sponsors. The student would be eligible for the maximum loan if the combined household income is £25,000 or less.

Thanks, Drew