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Personal information charter - Student Loans Company

How the Student Loans Company keeps your information safe and confidential.

This charter sets out what you can expect from us when we request, process and retain your personal information. It also covers what we ask from you to help us keep your information up to date.

You can find detailed information about how and why we process your personal information in our Privacy Notice.

You can find detailed information about how we process special category and criminal offence data in our Appropriate Policy Document.

Types of information we hold/retain

Most of the information we hold is collected during the initial application for student finance. Some examples are:

  • personal details, such as name and date of birth;
  • contact details, such as email address and telephone number;
  • financial information, such as bank account details and national insurance number
  • address history; and
  • nationality and residency.

Whose information we hold/retain

We use information from a variety of sources to carry out our work. Some examples are:

  • students applying for student finance;
  • parents or partners of students who support applications;
  • sponsors who support applications;
  • contact details of ‘alternative contacts’ given to us by students;
  • Further and Higher Education Providers such as universities and colleges; and
  • current and former employees.

How to find out what information we hold.

You have a right to request access to the personal information that we hold by making a subject access request.Make a Subject Access Request to the Student Loans Company (SLC) - GOV.UK

What we use/process your information for

We require information to help us:

  • determine whether applicants are eligible for student finance;
  • process applications for student finance;
  • calculate how much student finance applicants are eligible for;
  • make payments to customers;
  • maintain accurate and up-to-date records;
  • answer queries that students, sponsors, parents or partners, might have in relation to a student finance application;
  • process complaints and appeals submitted by customers;
  • collect student loan repayments; and
  • authenticate individuals who make a data subject rights request.

In return we ask you to:

  • give us correct and complete information;
  • tell us if anything changes.

This helps us make sure the information we hold is accurate and up to date.

Keeping your information safe

We take the issue of data protection and the security of our customers’ personal information very seriously. We have processes and safeguards in place to ensure that personal information is handled securely and in accordance with all legislative and regulatory requirements. Our staff follow security protocols and are regularly trained on how to keep information safe.

We’ll only process your information for specific purposes and store it in a secure manner.

Why we continue to hold information after customers have finished or left their course

When customers take out a student loan, it is likely that they will be making repayments for several years after they have finished or left their course. This means we will retain most of their information until they have repaid their loan in full, or the loan has been written off.

Our Records Management Policy involves key stages where the information we hold on a customer’s record can be reduced through data minimisation activity. For example, six years after a customer has finished or left their course, or six years after a customer has fully paid off their loan. After a customer’s data has been minimised at six years post repayment/write off, we’ll continue to hold the necessary amount of of data to fulfil our regulatory obligations in the form of a ‘Lifetime’ record. A customer’s Lifetime record is held until 70 years after their date of birth, when their record is fully erased from our systems.

For more information on  how long we keep your information, see SLCs Records Management Policy.

What are your rights?

You have a range of specific rights that you can exercise under UK data protection legislation. Find out more information within our Data Subject Rights factsheet.

How to contact us

If you have any enquiries about how we process or store your personal information, you can contact us by:

  • writing to:

Data Protection Officer
Student Loans Company
10 Clyde Place
Glasgow
G5 8DF

For independent advice about data protection and privacy issues, you can contact the Information Commission by:

  • writing to:

Information Commission
4th Floor
No3 Circle Square
5 Hawkshaw Street
Manchester
M1 7BL

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