The Education (Student Loans) (Repayment) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2009

Time for and amount of repayments

24.—(1) Every borrower who has received a notice from the Department of a requirement to make repayments of a student loan under regulation 11(3)(a) must make repayment in respect of any tax year—

(a) which is specified in a notice under regulation 11(3)(a) or which is any subsequent year up to and including any year specified in a notice under regulation 11(3)(c); and

(b) for which the borrower has been required to make and deliver a return under section 8 of the 1970 Act.

(2) The repayment must be an amount equal to 9% of the borrower’s total income for that year calculated in accordance with paragraph (3).

(3) A borrower’s total income for the purposes of paragraph (2) will be calculated by identifying the borrower’s total income in accordance with step 1 of section 23 of the 2007 Act and from that total income:

(a) excluding the first £15,000;

(b) excluding unearned income unless the amount of such income for that year exceeds £2,000;

(c) excluding incapacity benefit payable under the Social Security Contributions and Benefits (Northern Ireland) Act 1992(1);

(d) excluding amounts chargeable to tax under Chapters 5, 6, 7 or 10 of Part 3 of the 2003 Act (benefits in kind);

(e) excluding employment and support allowance paid under the Welfare Reform Act (Northern Ireland) 2007(2);

(f) deducting the amount of any loss in respect of which relief is given under—

(i) section 64 of the 2007 Act (in respect of losses in a trade, profession or vocation), or

(ii) section 128 of the 2007 Act (in respect of losses in an employment); and

(g) deducting the amount of any payment in respect of which relief is given under section 96 of the 2007 Act (relief for post-cessation expenditure);

(h) deducting any amounts in respect of which relief is given under Part 4 Chapter 4 of the Finance Act 2004 (pension schemes etc)(3) and that have not been included in the calculation of total income at step 1 of section 23 of the 2007 Act(4).

(4) For the purposes of this regulation, unearned income is income other than—

(a) income charged under the provisions of either the 2003 Act or Part 2 of the 2005 Act except jobseeker’s allowance to which Chapter 3 of Part 10 of the 2003 Act applies; and

(b) the profits of a UK furnished holiday lettings business within the meaning of section 127(2) of the 2007 Act.

(5) For the purposes of this regulation, “jobseeker’s allowance” means an allowance within the meaning of Part II of the Jobseekers (Northern Ireland) Order 1995(5).

(1)

1992 c.7

(2)

2007 c.2 (N.I.)

(3)

2004 c.2 (N.I.)

(4)

The requirements to ‘exclude’ certain income and to ‘deduct’ other sources of income from a borrower’s total income for the purposes of student loan repayments reflects the structure of section 23 of the 2007 Act

(5)

SI 1995/2705 (N.I. 15)