Student Support Fund Grants

Undergraduate Students 

Applications are assessed using the shortfall model, which looks at the difference between your income and expenditure. When looking at your expenditure, we will consider it against standardised thresholds that depend on your circumstances. If this calculation shows that you have a deficit, we will award you this deficit amount, up to the maximum award of £2000. 

If our calculation shows that you have sufficient income to cover your expenditure, we will not ususally be able to make an award to you. However, we may be able to make an award to you if you meet either of the following criteria:

• You require support for costs that are essential (e.g. rent/mortgage, food, travel costs to university) and you are unable to pay for these through other financial means
• You require support for specific costs that are unexpected or that a student would not have reasonably been expected to make financial provision for

Postgraduate Students 

Postgraduate students are expected to have made sufficient provision to cover their essential costs, before enrolling on their course of study so we are usually only able to provide financial support to cover specific costs that are unexpected or that a student would not have reasonably been expected to make financial provision for. 

We can only consider applications for EU and International students if they are experiencing financial hardship due to an unexpected crisis or because something has happened outside of their control. We can also only assist EU and international students if they have insufficient funds to cover their essential costs such as rent and food. If you have sufficient funds to cover essential costs, we will not be able to make an award to you. 

Students often tell us that although they have money to cover their essential costs, they plan on using this money to pay their tuition fees but we can only assist students in emergency situations who have no funds to pay for rent, food and other costs. Saving the money you do have so you can pay your tuition fees, is not grounds to receive support through the Student Support Fund. 

We will also only be able to provide financial support to you if we are confident your financial difficulties are temporary.   

Initially, we need to see evidence of your student funding, tenancy agreement/mortgage statements and bank statements for the last 3 months. The application form will guide you through the evidence you need to submit. We may need to see further evidence of your income and expenditure, and we will notify you of this via email. 

Please note that the assessor will review your bank statements and may need to ask you for clarification for any regular payments, or transactions over £100, so that they can build a better understanding of your financial situation. 

We need to confirm your situation to make sure we are completing an accurate assessment. The evidence you provide will help us to see if you qualify for the SSF, as University funds are limited.

Then we will not be able to process your application. Make sure you check you have submitted the correct documents, as otherwise your application will be delayed.

Please be aware that an assessor may need to contact you to request addiitonal documentation, so that we can ensure we carry out a full assessment of your income and expenditure. 

We process applications as quickly as we are able to but at busy times, it may take up to 4 weeks. If you feel your case is an emergency, please call 01274 233218 or email [email protected] for further guidance. 

If you are facing an emergency - for example you have no money or food – please call 01274 233218 in the first instance. We need to know about your situation as far in advance as possible, as it can take up to 5 working days to arrange basic support.

All assessments follow strict guidelines based on the information you provide. Assessors have an element of discretion, but award decisions are always evidence based, so you need to tell us as much information about your situation as possible and back this up with evidence.

Any applications which an assessor thinks should be rejected for support are discussed at our Student Support Fund Committee to ensure that a student's circumstances are explored in full, before a decision is made. 

The minimum award is £250 and the maximum award is £2000 per academic year. If your assessment award is calculated as less than £100, no payment will be made. An application to the SSF is no guarantee that an award will be made. Do not rely on the SSF as your only option. If you are successful and you owe an outstanding debt to the University, we reserve the right to offset the award against your outstanding balance.

We will send an email to your student email address to make you aware of our decision.

Please email [email protected]

It would be useful in your email if you could explain your current financial cirucmstances, and send over bank statements for the last 3 months, for any accounts you own.