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Example of a student loan statement

Here is an example of a student loan statement. For more information about what certain things mean, simply use your mouse and roll-over the question marks. Please Note: This example shows all the various transactions that may or may not appear on your statement.

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These transactions are from the new voluntary repayment bonus scheme. The most common write-off is for interest but can include situations where Inland Revenue deems that a transaction is uneconomical to pursue and it is written off for accounting purposes. This is the closing balance of the statement once all of the transactions have been taken into account. The closing balance will be the opening balance of the next statement. This section gives you detailed information of overdue payments. These are now past their due date, if you unable to pay these you must contact Inland Revenue as soon as possible. These are payments that are not yet overdue but indicate to you that they are due shortly. This is a summary of all interest transactions from the start of the financial year to the date the statement was printed. This is the interest rate at the time the statement was issued. If the loan balance is nil or in credit this rate will show at the end of the account summary section. Sometimes an account ends up with a credit. In this case Inland Revenue can refund the credit. A remission is where a transaction such as a penalty was applied correctly but Inland Revenue has decided to remit this. These are mainly repayments made through the PAYE system from your employer. Sometimes when a transaction has been made in error the only way to fix it is to reverse this back out. Along with court costs, Inland Revenue may charge you solicitor fees. A transfer is where a transaction has been transferred in or out of the account e.g. a payment went to the wrong period and had to be transferred. If a student loan dispute is ever taken to court, Inland Revenue may charge you with court costs. Although the majority of student loans that Inland Revenue administers are interest–free, Inland Revenue adds the interest and then writes this off once it has been determined that you are entitled to an interest-free loan. Sometimes you are not entitled to an interest-free loan; this could be because you are registered as an Overseas Based Borrower. These are loans that have been transferred either to or from StudyLink. Most of these payments are from you making payments directly to Inland Revenue for things such as interim assessments or voluntary repayments. Penalties and associated penalty type transactions can be added to your loan for a number of reasons. The most common is when you’ve made a late payment. These are amounts charged to your account that increase your student loan balance, like interest or late payment penalties. These are amounts credited to your account that reduce your loan This is the closing balance from your last statement. If this is your first statement from us, the amount displays as nil. There have been times when Inland Revenue has offered an amnesty on certain obligations. Student loan obligations are made up from assessments. Usually these are calculated using income details, but other formulas can be used. For example if you are overseas then your assessment could be based on the size of your loan. These dates are printed as effective dates, which mean they could appear to be out of order. The printed date represents the date that the transaction is effective, not necessarily when it happened. This is a detailed breakdown of transactions within the statement period. There are over 100 different types of transactions that can appear in the ‘Account activity’ field so these have been summarized into smaller categories. This information is read by Inland Revenue’s processing machines to help allocate the payments to the correct borrower and period. They are magnetic, so even if you scribble it out the machine will still read it.This field can be used to make voluntary repayments above your obligated amounts. If you pay more than $500.00 above your obligation, you may be entitled to a voluntary repayment bonus.This is made up of a number of different penalties which can range from late payments to an under estimation of an assessment. This is a total of all interest charged for that period. This figure represents any amount that is currently overdue and needs to be paid immediately. If you dispute this amount or can’t afford it, you must contact Inland Revenue as soon as possible. More details of this can be found in the ‘Repayments overdue’ section.This is made up of a number of different debits such as amnesty penalties, court costs, solicitors fees and a number of other reversals, refunds or transfers.This is a summary of interest written off between two specific dates. This is made up of a number of different credits such as amnesty penalty reductions, court costs and solicitor fee reversals.This shows you your IRD number, statement number, the date the statement was issued and for what period it relates to. This is the same information as shown in the ‘High value’ section. It is the total of all repayments and payments credited to the loan account for that period.These are loans that are transferred back to StudyLink, e.g. if StudyLink reverses the loan after it has been sent to Inland Revenue. If you have made repayments to Inland Revenue prior to your loan being transferred, a credit interest adjustment is calculated.This is the closing balance from your last statement. If this is your first statement from us, the amount displays as nil.This is the total of all repayments that are now overdue. If you want to dispute this amount or can’t afford it, you must contact Inland Revenue as soon as possible. More details of this can be found in the ‘Repayments overdue’ section.This is the total of all repayments and payments credited to the loan account for that period. This includes transactions such as standard payments, repayments, credit transfers, small balance write offs, hardship remissions and refund reversals. A break down of individual transactions is presented in the ‘Account activity’ section.This is the amount of your total loan balance at the time of printing the statement. This figure is the total of the ‘Opening balance’ and other transactions as shown below in the ‘Account summary’ section. This is a summary of all the transactions that make up ‘Your current loan balance’ for the statement period.This section provides you with important information up front so you don’t have to go searching the statement for it. If you took out a loan in the previous academic year, this tells you the total amount transferred from StudyLink to Inland Revenue. The principal and interest components are detailed on the next page under the ‘Account activity’ section.

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