Birth Cert not good enough for Student Finance England
Discussion
Hope I've put this in the correct place....
Daughter going to Uni in Sept and fortunate enough to be on one of the funded NHS courses. NHS (understandably) have seen her Driving License and Birth Certificate and accepted it as proof of identity- All sent by Special delivery and pre-paid return Special Delivery. Subsequent to all this applied to Student Finance England for student loan (for accom etc) as is the normal practice. SFE require to see her proof of NHS funding and Birth Certificate and application forms, all sent by signed for delivery. Now it gets more complicated. SFE return docs, but say they need a form signed by a responsible individual (list including doctors, police officers, Post masters etc, usual sort of thing) to verify that she is the person on her Birth Certificate (I kid ye not). This person has to have known her for over 2 years and within the last 2 years, have a UK passport, and also include their passport number on the form. So round to our village Post Office where they know her, and the Post Master does the necessary, and puts his title "Sub-Post Master" because is is a Sub-Post Office. SFE reject this. On questioning why, they say he is not of high enough standing. So we are stuck, as she doesn't know anyone else who's known her more than 2 years - her 6th form college tutors haven't known her long enough, and the previous school tutors haven't seen her recently enough. My wife asked them if they could just delete the word "sub", but they said they can't do this and are sending a new form, and if we re-submit without the word "sub" and signed by the same individual they will accept it - She asked them if they were really thinking about what they'd just said and how absurd it was? They weren't bothered. To complicate further the sub (or not) Post Master has just been admitted to hospital suffering from Cancer, so the last thing we would consider is visiting him in hospital asking him to sign forms! I'm pretty confident the GP (who seems to change every 6 months) and doesn't know her would happily anything without question for £50. What an absurd illogical double check for something that's already been checked by the NHS who are actually giving funding to her education.
So that's my rant for this week. I'll just add that this is red tape gone mad, and while we are checking out to the nth degree (with irrational logic) our aspiring degree students (who are applying for a loan which they will pay back with interest), there are unknown Rapists, Murderers and Terrorists entering our island (albeit not many in those categories, but you get my drift)
Daughter going to Uni in Sept and fortunate enough to be on one of the funded NHS courses. NHS (understandably) have seen her Driving License and Birth Certificate and accepted it as proof of identity- All sent by Special delivery and pre-paid return Special Delivery. Subsequent to all this applied to Student Finance England for student loan (for accom etc) as is the normal practice. SFE require to see her proof of NHS funding and Birth Certificate and application forms, all sent by signed for delivery. Now it gets more complicated. SFE return docs, but say they need a form signed by a responsible individual (list including doctors, police officers, Post masters etc, usual sort of thing) to verify that she is the person on her Birth Certificate (I kid ye not). This person has to have known her for over 2 years and within the last 2 years, have a UK passport, and also include their passport number on the form. So round to our village Post Office where they know her, and the Post Master does the necessary, and puts his title "Sub-Post Master" because is is a Sub-Post Office. SFE reject this. On questioning why, they say he is not of high enough standing. So we are stuck, as she doesn't know anyone else who's known her more than 2 years - her 6th form college tutors haven't known her long enough, and the previous school tutors haven't seen her recently enough. My wife asked them if they could just delete the word "sub", but they said they can't do this and are sending a new form, and if we re-submit without the word "sub" and signed by the same individual they will accept it - She asked them if they were really thinking about what they'd just said and how absurd it was? They weren't bothered. To complicate further the sub (or not) Post Master has just been admitted to hospital suffering from Cancer, so the last thing we would consider is visiting him in hospital asking him to sign forms! I'm pretty confident the GP (who seems to change every 6 months) and doesn't know her would happily anything without question for £50. What an absurd illogical double check for something that's already been checked by the NHS who are actually giving funding to her education.
So that's my rant for this week. I'll just add that this is red tape gone mad, and while we are checking out to the nth degree (with irrational logic) our aspiring degree students (who are applying for a loan which they will pay back with interest), there are unknown Rapists, Murderers and Terrorists entering our island (albeit not many in those categories, but you get my drift)
Theophany said:
FredClogs said:
There is massive fraud around student loans and university financing. It's a lot of money with a very long repayment period, I don't know why you'd expect to just hand it over to any old sausage or other.
What, like every other government run entity that happily forks out money like it's going out of fashion?NHS have checked and are providing bulk of the funding. SFE can check on her birth cert origins, her driving license, and the passport of the signatory. The other option they gave (ironically) was to get her a passport (which would be signed by our (sub or not) Postmaster and supply that as they would accept that without any further checks. Hmm, so those with fake passports have easy loans then???
RobinOakapple said:
jdw100 said:
Fastpedeller said:
Hope I've put this in the correct place....
Daughter going to Uni in Sept and fortunate enough to be on one of the funded NHS courses. NHS (understandably) have seen her Driving License and Birth Certificate and accepted it as proof of identity- All sent by Special delivery and pre-paid return Special Delivery. Subsequent to all this applied to Student Finance England for student loan (for accom etc) as is the normal practice. SFE require to see her proof of NHS funding and Birth Certificate and application forms, all sent by signed for delivery. Now it gets more complicated. SFE return docs, but say they need a form signed by a responsible individual (list including doctors, police officers, Post masters etc, usual sort of thing) to verify that she is the person on her Birth Certificate (I kid ye not). This person has to have known her for over 2 years and within the last 2 years, have a UK passport, and also include their passport number on the form. So round to our village Post Office where they know her, and the Post Master does the necessary, and puts his title "Sub-Post Master" because is is a Sub-Post Office. SFE reject this. On questioning why, they say he is not of high enough standing. So we are stuck, as she doesn't know anyone else who's known her more than 2 years - her 6th form college tutors haven't known her long enough, and the previous school tutors haven't seen her recently enough. My wife asked them if they could just delete the word "sub", but they said they can't do this and are sending a new form, and if we re-submit without the word "sub" and signed by the same individual they will accept it - She asked them if they were really thinking about what they'd just said and how absurd it was? They weren't bothered. To complicate further the sub (or not) Post Master has just been admitted to hospital suffering from Cancer, so the last thing we would consider is visiting him in hospital asking him to sign forms! I'm pretty confident the GP (who seems to change every 6 months) and doesn't know her would happily anything without question for £50. What an absurd illogical double check for something that's already been checked by the NHS who are actually giving funding to her education.
So that's my rant for this week. I'll just add that this is red tape gone mad, and while we are checking out to the nth degree (with irrational logic) our aspiring degree students (who are applying for a loan which they will pay back with interest), there are unknown Rapists, Murderers and Terrorists entering our island (albeit not many in those categories, but you get my drift)
If she does get to Uni; ask her to teach you about paragraphs and spacing- that's one dense text block.Daughter going to Uni in Sept and fortunate enough to be on one of the funded NHS courses. NHS (understandably) have seen her Driving License and Birth Certificate and accepted it as proof of identity- All sent by Special delivery and pre-paid return Special Delivery. Subsequent to all this applied to Student Finance England for student loan (for accom etc) as is the normal practice. SFE require to see her proof of NHS funding and Birth Certificate and application forms, all sent by signed for delivery. Now it gets more complicated. SFE return docs, but say they need a form signed by a responsible individual (list including doctors, police officers, Post masters etc, usual sort of thing) to verify that she is the person on her Birth Certificate (I kid ye not). This person has to have known her for over 2 years and within the last 2 years, have a UK passport, and also include their passport number on the form. So round to our village Post Office where they know her, and the Post Master does the necessary, and puts his title "Sub-Post Master" because is is a Sub-Post Office. SFE reject this. On questioning why, they say he is not of high enough standing. So we are stuck, as she doesn't know anyone else who's known her more than 2 years - her 6th form college tutors haven't known her long enough, and the previous school tutors haven't seen her recently enough. My wife asked them if they could just delete the word "sub", but they said they can't do this and are sending a new form, and if we re-submit without the word "sub" and signed by the same individual they will accept it - She asked them if they were really thinking about what they'd just said and how absurd it was? They weren't bothered. To complicate further the sub (or not) Post Master has just been admitted to hospital suffering from Cancer, so the last thing we would consider is visiting him in hospital asking him to sign forms! I'm pretty confident the GP (who seems to change every 6 months) and doesn't know her would happily anything without question for £50. What an absurd illogical double check for something that's already been checked by the NHS who are actually giving funding to her education.
So that's my rant for this week. I'll just add that this is red tape gone mad, and while we are checking out to the nth degree (with irrational logic) our aspiring degree students (who are applying for a loan which they will pay back with interest), there are unknown Rapists, Murderers and Terrorists entering our island (albeit not many in those categories, but you get my drift)
EnglishTony said:
Pay the local GP his/her 50 quid and stop whinging.
Britain is looking keep this, deal with it.
But the point I'm making (maybe you didn't see it because of my poor layout as criticised by others) is that the GP doesn't even know her! I'm ok with all the checks if they are applied with sound logic and intelligence.Britain is looking keep this, deal with it.
Snubs said:
I love these throwbacks to the Victorian era idea of 'community members of good standing'. Because you never see the police, doctors or politicians in the press for malpractice. They're above sin, unlike the rest of us vassals 
Just a thought OP but do they not accept chartered professionals like accountants and so on? You can be a Chartered pretty much anything these days, so there may be a friend of a family that qualifies?
Indeed. I'd like to think that in any situation my word is as good as any other person's. "Some are more equal than others" is a phrase that springs to mind. We live in a small, rural community and Farmers aren't (apparently) high enough up the pecking order. Just a thought OP but do they not accept chartered professionals like accountants and so on? You can be a Chartered pretty much anything these days, so there may be a friend of a family that qualifies?
Ironically the local MP has known our daughter for several years - local school visits and the like, so that would potentially be our next course of action if we were to pursue this (It would be strange if he didn't count because of any political bias!). In the meantime we are going to withdraw the application - my Wife has (quite correctly) stated it isn't worth the stress. We will finance this small amount and we won't be paying the interest to an organisation like SFE.
Impasse said:
Fairly sure there's a proposal to bin the bursaries and replace them with loans, so whoever the OP manages to persuade to sign the piece of paper he'd better get it done quick!
Hers is the last intake to be bursary funded. We have the bursary funding all arranged - the NHS believed the Birth Certificate without its backup 'Birth certificate verification form'. Maybe they remember bringing her into the world!;)grumpy52 said:
As anybody can apply to get a copy birth certificate by just providing basic details and paying £10 all done over the phone is it really surprising that they want this proof .
As I stated previously, I have no problem with any checks as long as they make logical sense. Stating "this man's say-so is not go because his title is "sub Post Master", but apply again with the title "Postmaster" for the same person is absolute nonsense.Gassing Station | The Lounge | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff