Student Loans Company

Postgraduate Loans Awareness Seminar

Workshop

Student Loans Company

Purpose & Aims of Workshop

To share SLC design

proposals to date to

administer Postgraduate

Loans

To allow SLC to gather HE

Providers initial feedback

around system design and processes

To enable HE Providers to

develop Action Plans to deliver Postgraduate Loans to your

students

To identify ‘Next Steps’ and

consider future material, training,

guidance and Best Practice for

the sector

Format of Workshop

Course

submission

via CMS

Student

application

process, IAG

& Repay

Summary

Registration

process via

Student

Information

Service

Table

Discussion

Table

Discussion

Table

Discussion

Feedback

Student Loans Company

Course submission –

Courses Management Service (CMS)

• Authority funded HE Provider or Alternative Providers with Degree Awarding Powers in the UK

• Postgraduate Master’s education provision is a devolved matter and applicable to England only.( i.e.

English domiciled students studying at an institution anywhere in UK or by distance learning in England

and EU students studying in England)

• Courses starting on or after 1 August 2016 ( AY16/17)

• Eligible courses: Stand alone Masters courses (taught and research) with no subject restrictions

– Courses currently funded by undergraduate support system, e.g. Master of Architecture and

Postgraduate Certificate of Education are not eligible

• Course length:

– Full Time – 1 or 2 years

– Part Time @ minimum 50% intensity up to 4 years (Note - payments are only made over the first 2

years of the course, even if studied part time over 3 or 4 years)

Key Policy Summary

• Design validated with CMS User Group on 8th December 2015

• All relevant providers to enter both full and part time Postgraduate course details on

CMS from March / April 2016

• Details of all Postgraduate courses to be submitted by providers for MI purposes

‒ approx 18,000 courses expected

• Full and part time Postgraduate course entry format is the same

• PGL service anticipated to go live Summer 2016

CMS course collection

• CMS has been developed to ensure Postgraduate courses can be identified when a

student applies on-line

• The Copy Course functionality has been switched back on in CMS to assist with course

data entry

• CMS Export includes Funding Level to enable providers to distinguish between

Postgraduate and Undergraduate courses

• Course Search facility will be extended to include Postgraduate

and Undergraduate

CMS changes

How to add a Postgraduate Course to CMS

• Introduction of Funding Level

• Validation to ensure that Postgraduate courses can only be entered from AY 16/17 onwards

How to add a Postgraduate Course to CMS

• When Postgraduate Funding Level is

selected only two qualifications are

available

‒ Taught

‒ Research

• These new qualifications are not listed

on the Undergraduate qualification

dropdown

How to add a Postgraduate Course to CMS

• When Postgraduate Funding Level is

selected the duration is defaulted to 1

or 2 years

• UCAS codes, HEP codes and Subject

Categories all mirror Undergraduate

• The only attribute applicable &

available for Postgraduate courses is

Distance Learning

How to add a Postgraduate Course to CMS

AY section:

• Domicile designation will be set in background to England only as per policy

• Locations and Available Course Years functionality will be the same as Undergraduate

How to add a Postgraduate Course to CMS

• Only the Course Start Date is required to be entered in CMS for both FT & PT courses

• Date entered will trigger the first payment and determines subsequent payment dates

How to add a Postgraduate Course to CMS

Table Discussion

Student Loans Company

Student IAG, application process, SFE

delivery and repayments

• UK Nationals ordinarily resident in England and EU nationals under 60 years on 1st day of

1st Academic year of the course

– Academic Year period 12 months starting 1st Sept, 1st Jan, 1st Apr or 1st July

• Students can

– apply for a non means tested loan up to a maximum of £10,000

– apply up to 9 months after AY start date

– request a Loan Amount change up to 1 month before AY end date

• Applicants are not eligible

– if they have outstanding student loan arrears or have been found unfit for student

support (e.g. Attempted fraud)

– in prison (Prisoner students, whether on remand or sentenced)

– If they already hold a Master’s qualification (or an equivalent or higher

level qualification)

Key Policy Summary

Late January

• High level information to raise awareness, including ‘coming soon’ messaging for social media channels

• Printed resources for students which HEPs will be able to order

• High level Factsheet for practitioners

April

• More detailed information, including

‒ Printed quick guides about the application process and repayment

‒ Quick guides to order from the practitioner website

‒ Continued activity on social media channels

‒ Customer facing films on YouTube and the practitioner website

Launch

• “Apply Now” messaging on social media channels

• Postgraduate Loans Main Guide and Terms and Conditions on the practitioner website and Gov.uk

Timeline for student IAG

• Application launch Summer 2016

• Only one application per course, no necessity to apply per year

• Online or paper application

• As per undergraduate process, as application relates to a new course, further identity

check required e.g. passport number requested

• Re-use of NINO if held, otherwise requested and validated with DWP

– Excludes EU students if NINO not held

• Questions define length of course and amount of loan per year

– Paid over the first 2 years of course

Student Application Process

Login to Gov.uk

Finance Application

Undergraduate or Postgraduate

Question Flow

Questions regarding Loan

If the student has selected a 1 yr course

Questions regarding Loan

If the student has selected a 2 yr course

Questions regarding Loan

If the student has selected a 2 yr course

Repayment questions

Information will be provided here to inform the applicant about how the interest

and repayment works with the loan and what happens if they also have previous

loans

Details for two contacts

For repayment purposes we ask for and capture contact details of two people, family

members not at the same address or a friend

Student Payment Summary

• Specific data processing team to be recruited to manage delivery

• Expansion of specialist evidence management teams to support delivery

– experienced teams will be bolstered to handle the increased volume of customers who will provide

physical identity and residency evidence

– these teams already manage the same evidence types for HE full-time, part-time and the

Advanced Learner Loans (referred to as 24+)

• Utilisation of existing automated data share checking services – HMPO, DWP

– data shares with strategic partners enhance the capacity to automate the end to end application

process

– in HE 70% of applicants are processed through the HMPO data share

• New PGL specific platform to manage application processing

– the platform to specifically support PGL applications and policy requirements

– across SLC sites to provide access to business experts from multiple team areas

– presented to internal and external colleagues regularly to showcase the functional

development progress

SFE delivery plans

• Existing application management systems being enhanced to deliver on-line digital service

delivery for customers

– HE on-line application take up is 95%+, we expect similar in PGL

• Robust contingency plans are being developed for management of application process if

required

• Expected application profile volume

– the expected volume of applications in Year 1 is 57,000

– the volume expected is similar to that received for the launch of Part-time loans

– the product itself is similar in terms of processing requirement to a Non-Means tested

full-time HE application

SFE delivery plans

Postgraduate Repayment Plan

• Income contingent repayment term, runs concurrently with any other student loan repayments (i.e. Plan

1 or Plan 2)

• Interest is calculated at RPI + 3% on outstanding PGL balances (in course or out of course whether

making repayments or not)

• Repayment amount is 6% of income above £21,000 from tax year 2019/20, or when loan enters

repayment

• Repayment from overseas – threshold is applied based on the cost of living in country of residence

• Write off of any outstanding balance on 30th anniversary of repayment, or in the event of death or

permanent disability preventing work

Table Discussion

Student Loans Company

Registration, Reporting & Monitoring Process

Student Information Service (SIS)

Key Policy Summary and Provider Responsibility

• One confirmation of study required from HE Provider at the start of each academic year of the course

‒ student is in study and on track to complete the course within the specified course duration

• Explicit confirmation at start of course, releases payment to students in Payment Periods 2 and 3

‒ Provider responsibility to ensure student is still in study during census period prior to each of the two further

payments

• Timely submission of Change of Circumstances

‒ Withdrawals, Course transfers, Provider transfers, Suspension & Resumption

• Retrospective withdrawal to result in overpayment and immediate repayment by student

• SLC to monitor Provider compliance and performance regarding registration reporting and CoC submission in line with

the Service Management Framework

• BIS will review results of compliance monitoring and may revert to initial proposal of 3 confirmations if

any issues are found

System changes for Postgraduate Students in SIS

Postgraduate

Students available to view from launch in

Summer 2016

New Search Filters on View

Student Information and

Registration Worklist screens

- Funding Level

- Qualifications

No Manual Registration for Postgraduate

students

New CoC screens and enhanced validation

Extended Student

Information File export – new

field for “Funding Level”

View Student Information – Funding Level filter

Registration

• Student visible on Registration

Worklist 30 days prior to the Start

Date of course.

• One registration confirmation

required to release all three

payments

• New filters allow you to search

Registration Worklist for Funding

Level & Qualification

• Registration worklist results will

also provide Course Start Date

information

Course Start Date

Manual Registration

• No Manual Registration for Postgraduate

• Where the application resides in SIS at any Provider the Create Manual Registration screen will not allow you to

progress

• Row specific error messages added to Create Manual Registration screen to easily identify which rows cannot be

submitted

Change of Circumstances

Redesigned screens to

ensure visibility of information throughout

CoC creation process

Removal of field entry for information which is not relevant to

Postgraduate CoC

Additional validation

throughout the process

No bulk upload facility

A new Postgraduate

CoC Submission

Report

Change of Circumstances categories

Withdrawals:

SLC to be notified immediately to prevent payments being made to the student when they

are no longer in study. Any payment made after student left study treated as loan

overpayment

Course Transfers:

Between eligible Postgraduate Master’s courses internally

Provider Transfers:

Any New Provider must ‘transfer in’ student (no transfer out CoC available)

Suspension & Resumption:

As is process with enhanced screens

Create Postgraduate CoC

• Students will be paid in 3 equal instalments

– It is the Providers responsibility to ensure that the student is still in study prior to 2nd

and 3rd instalments being released

• First available payment date on Course start date

− Payment 1: Course start date

− Payment 2: 4 months after the course start month (last Wed of month)

− Payment 3: 7 months after the course start month (last Wed of month)

• No payment released until NINO verified by DWP

• No minimum loan request. Student able to amend loan requested up to 1

month before end of academic year

Payment to Students

Student Payments

AY 2016/17

Payment Period 1 Payment Period 2 Payment Period 3

Course Start Month Start* ^ End**

Start ** ^ End**

Start** ^ End**

August 22/08/2016 24/01/2017 25/01/2017 25/04/2017 26/04/2017 31/08/2017

September 26/09/2016 24/01/2017 25/01/2017 25/04/2017 26/04/2017 31/08/2017

October 10/10/2016 21/02/2017 22/02/2017 30/05/2017 31/05/2017 31/08/2017

November 14/11/2016 28/03/2017 29/03/2017 27/06/2017 28/06/2017 31/08/2017

December 05/12/2016 25/04/2017 26/04/2017 25/07/2017 26/07/2017 31/08/2017

January 09/01/2017 30/05/2017 31/05/2017 29/08/2017 30/08/2017 31/12/2017

February 06/02/2017 27/06/2017 28/06/2017 26/09/2017 27/09/2017 31/12/2017

March 06/03/2017 25/07/2017 26/07/2017 24/10/2017 25/10/2017 31/12/2017

April 10/04/2017 29/08/2017 30/08/2017 28/11/2017 29/11/2017 31/03/2018

May 01/05/2017 26/09/2017 27/09/2017 26/12/2017 27/12/2017 31/03/2018

June 05/06/2017 24/10/2017 25/10/2017 30/01/2018 31/01/2018 31/03/2018

July 03/07/2017 28/11/2017 29/11/2017 27/02/2018 28/02/2018 30/06/2018

Course start date last Wed in each month last Wed in each month

Notes:

* Course start date (within the AY) entered by provider into CMS

** All other start/end dates generated by CMS according to start date. Courses end at the end of the academic year within each AY quarter

^ Payments to student will occur at the start of each payment period (subject to explicit confirmation in period 1 and ongoing census for periods 2 & 3)

Table Discussion

Student Loans Company

Summary of Feedback & Next Steps

Review of the workshop objectives

To share SLC design

proposals to date to

administer Postgraduate

Loans

To allow SLC to gather HE

Providers initial

feedback around system

design and processes

To enable HE Providers to

develop Action Plans

to deliver Postgraduate Loans to your

students

To identify ‘Next Steps’ and consider

future material, training,

guidance and Best Practice for the sector

Format of Workshop

Course

submission

via CMS

Student

application

process, IAG

& Repay

Summary

Registration

process via

Student

Information

Service

Table

Discussion

Table

Discussion

Table

Discussion

Feedback

Next Steps

• Q&A document compiled from the Table Discussions

• Workshops at Student Support Seminar in March 2016

• Regular briefings via HEP Services Bulletins, alongside

Stakeholder Services

• All information available on the Practitioner Website

• Gather HEP Action Plans via Survey monkey

• Update at Summer Service Review Forums