Students hit hard by grant delays

UP to 50,000 students will face delays of up to a month in receiving their maintenance grants at the start of the college year.

The delay also means thousands of students eligible for a grant will have to pay the college registration fee of €670 and then await a refund.

The poorest families will be hit hardest by the late payment as

students from disadvantaged backgrounds will be left out of pocket.

The delay has been caused by the Department of Education's failure to provide application forms for the college grant until this week.

The first term grant cheque is normally paid late September or early October, but thousands of cash strapped students now have to wait until almost November to receive their cheques.

The first instalment is worth:

Disadvantaged student living away from home €1,333.

Disadvantaged student living at home €533.

Student on full grant living away from home €837.

Student on full grant living at home €335.

Student on half grant living away from home €418.

Student on half grant living at home €167.

In some cases local authorities and VECs, which process the applications, had to wait until yesterday to get the forms four weeks later than usual.

The Department of Education said the delay was caused by changes to the application caused by the adjustment of the tax year and difficulties in the printing of the form itself.

Although the department refused to accept that the backlog would result in delay in the payment of the grant cheques, the head of the VEC association which deals with 30,000 applications said late payments were a certainty in some cases.

Irish Vocational Education Association chief executive Michael Moriarty said the Department of Education had known of the delay for months.

"I raised this at assistant secretary level six weeks ago and was told the form would be out shortly. The applications cannot be processed in the time scale now given to us," he said.

Last week, Education Minister Noel Dempsey said educational disadvantage would be the main focus of his tenure of office.

But this delay in the grant payment will affect poorest families most, stated the Union of Students in Ireland.

USI president Colm Jordan said it beggared belief the minister had not alerted parents to the problem.

"Not content with attacking the poorest families through cutbacks, a departmental oversight is set to hurt them further," he said.

According to Mr Jordan, if students do not have proof that they are receiving a grant, they have to pay the increased €670 college registration fee, regardless of their parents income.

"When the students have proof that they will be receiving a grant, the money is refunded, but in some cases this can take several months. For example, one mother phoned me up saying that in a similar situation last year, it was February before she was refunded the registration fee," he said.

Laying the blame for the delay with Minister Dempsey, Fine Gael said it was outrageous that students have to decide in the next few days on which courses to accept when they don't even know if they qualify for a grant.

"It is a disgrace that as college fees are re-introduced in the guise of 'registration fees', the price of student accommodation skyrockets, and the cost of living continues to climb at a rapid rate, the grant application forms arrived in local authority and VEC offices weeks later than normal," FG deputy finance spokesman Paul McGrath said.

Staff in grants offices are concerned that calls from parents anxious to get their applications processed in time for the start of the college year will now further stall their work.