Students Grants

My neighbour is hopping mad. I can't say I blame her.

It seems that the money her 17 year old earned, and paid tax on, while studying for the leaving cert has put the family over the income threshold for a student grant.

Classmates who stayed at home with similar family incomes are getting grants.

Lodge an appeal.

There is nothing to appeal, the combined income is above the threshold.

For the price of a stamp - it's always worth appealing.

Appealing a decision
If you think that you have been unjustly refused a grant, you may appeal by writing to the organisation you applied to. You must appeal within 30 days of getting your decision. If your appeal is turned down, and you feel that the conditions have not been interpreted correctly, you can make a further appeal.

Further appeals

If you are not satisfied with the decision from an appeals officer in a grant-awarding authority you can make a further appeal to the Student Grants Appeals Board. You should submit your appeal online to the Student Grants Appeals Board. Your appeal must be submitted within 30 days from the date of the letter from the appeals officer in SUSI or the awarding authority.

You can only appeal the outcome of a decision from an appeals officer in a grant-awarding authority to the Student Grants Appeals Board.
https://www.studentgrantappeals.ie/

Thank you for that very useful information and I will certainly pass it on.

However it seems clear that the student in question is not entitled to a grant as the family income exceeds the limit. There doesn't seem to be any grey area. What is frustrating my neighbour is that if the 17 year old had not worked over the summer and part time during the year the grant would have been available. She feels that encouraging her child to work may have been a mistake.

Since the foundation of this site I have been hammering away at the unfairness of many government grants especially Student University Grants. The only fair way is to give the grant to everybody or to nobody. I'll bet when this student goes to "3rd Level" he/she will come across many students who are on grants who should never have become within a smell of.

When ours went away to college we were not entitled to grants. I took a part-time job in a local pub to help finance their education as we could not get a grant. The publican for whom I worked had his offspring doing the same course as ours and was on a grant. The dad presented his with a car to make life easier while in college.

It's the same with the Medical Card system, Free School Books facility etc.

(Apologies for my appalling English; memories of 3rd Level Grants are just flooding back to me).

Can anybody give a ballpark figure to keep a student away in college these days?

had not worked over the summer

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Non-term time student earnings are definitely excluded. Appeal.

Thirsty said:

Non-term time student earnings are definitely excluded. Appeal.

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Good. It would be crazy if students were penalised for working harder. If anything grants should be reduced if the student doesn't get a summer job!

Thirsty said:

Non-term time student earnings are definitely excluded. Appeal.

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Can you point me in the direction of the basis for this. The SUSI site asks for the students income with no distinction between term time and non term time. They are all included in the total.

"I work part-time - will this affect my grant eligibility?

You (the applicant) can earn up to €4,500 in holiday earnings whilst in education, without any effect on your grant eligibility.

Holiday earnings up to €4,500 will not be included when calculating your reckonable income. If you earned more than €4,500 during holiday periods, the balance will be taken into account.

The periods normally considered as holidays are 2 weeks at Easter, 12 weeks of Summer (June, July and August) and 2 weeks at Christmas. If the holiday periods for your particular course/college were not consistent with these dates, we may ask for a letter from your school/ institution confirming the dates of term in order for your income to be treated as holiday earnings.

We will request all applicants to provide either payslips for the dates concerned or a statement of holiday earnings signed and stamped by your employer. The statement of holiday earnings form can be found through the following link:"

[broken link removed]


Marion

Thank you Marion.

just read procedure for assessment of means and seems to be very thorough

Do you know if their appeal was successful?