Repeating
Repeating part of your course, can affect practical issues such as your student funding entitlement and tuition fee liability and, if you are an international student, your student immigration permission.
Depending on the date you interrupt your studies, you may have to repeat the whole academic year or attend part of your course when you resume studies the following academic year. This often happens if a student interrupts their studies part-way though a Semester, before the start of an assessment period. Your School will advise you about the academic requirements, agree your date of interruption and the date when you can rejoin your course.
Even if you do not interrupt your studies, you may be required to re-sit assessments at the next available opportunity in order to progress onto the next academic year and this may require you to re-sit out of attendance for the some or all of the following academic year. Students who are are re-sitting out of attendance are not normally required to attend their course.
Medical and Dental students are usually required to re-take the whole academic year in attendance if they interrupt their studies or need to re-sit exams.
Contact the Student Support Officer for your School if you have questions about your course and academic options.
If you are required to re-sit out of attendance and are worried about how to remain engaged with your studies, you could also contact your Personal Adviser/Tutor to discuss planning any revision. Information about re-sitting out of attendance is also provided by Academic Registry.
If you feel you should be given an opportunity to attend your classes again. If your school does not approve this, you may decide to make a formal appeal. These appeals may not always succeed , as students are expected to have arranged an interruption of studies if they are not fit enough to engage with their studies or sit exams. For more information take a look at the information on QMUL academic Appeal information. If you would like advice about whether you have grounds to appeal, contact Annie Mitchell in the Academic Advice Service at the Students’ Union.
How student funding, tuition fees and student visas are affected
This depends on whether you re-sit out of attendance or re-take with attendance.
For information choose from one of the following options:
Re-sitting out of Attendance
- Your Funding
Wherever your funding comes from, it's important to check if your funding will stop while you are re-sitting out of attendance.
If it continues to be paid, you should check whether this means that funding will not be available for a later period as there may be a limit to the number of years/months the funding can be paid.
If you are funded by Student Finance England different rules apply to undergraduate and postgraduate funding and its important to check this will be affected. This is explained further on our Student Funding Implications pages.
If you are an undergraduate student you may usually rely on the Maintenance Loan to cover your personal maintenance costs, your rent and other costs. However, Student Finance England do not provide any funding to students while they are registered as re-sitting out of attendance. As the Maintenance Loan is not available, you will need to make alternative plans to support yourself during your re-sit period. The Student Finance England Disabled Students Allowance and the Queen Mary Bursary are also not available during this time.
- If you are an international student in the UK on a student visa
You are not normally able to remain in the UK while you are re-sitting out of attendance as you are not required to attend your course, and you will require a new student visa to return to the UK to continue your studies. Further information about how your student visa is affected can be found in our Visa Implications and changes to your programme .
- Tuition Fees:
A tuition fee is not normally charged when a student is registered as re-sitting out of attendance.
Also read our information about Other Practicalities for information about the Queen Mary facilities you can use if you are re-sitting out of attendance.
Re-taking with Attendance
- Your funding
If you receive any type of funding, it is very important to find out if you can continue to receive this funding for your re-take period and how this may affect your overall funds. For example check if receiving funding during a retake year will affect your entitlement further down the line as there may be a limit to the amount or number of years the funding can be paid.
- Student Finance England funding
Student Finance England apply different rules apply to undergraduate and postgraduate funding. For example:
Key issue for undergraduate students: If you usually receive Student Finance England funding, the Maintenance Loan would normally remain available for a retake period providing attendance is required. This may be available for a full year or for part of the year depending on your course attendance. However Student Finance England limit the number of years that a student can be awarded the undergraduate SFE Tuition Fee Loan. This may not be automatically be available to you for a retake year or part year if you have repeated before or you have any previous degree level study on an earlier course. If you rely on this loan to pay your tuition fees, first contact Student Finance England to ask if this loan will be available to you for the re-take period. Also read our Student Funding implications page for further information about repeat study and the standard tuition fee loan entitlement. This includes how to request an additional year of tuition fee loan if you have exhausted your standard entitlement and your retake is due to compelling personal reasons.
Key issue for postgraduate students: Student Finance England Postgraduate loans are also limited and additional extra payments of loan are not available for retake periods. Our Student Funding Implications page has more detailed information about how the funding is affected and the options available.
- Tuition fees - all students
A tuition fee is usually charged if a student re-takes a period in attendance. You will need to ensure you have sufficient funds to cover this additional fee in addition to your own maintenance costs. Have a look at out Tuition Fee implications section for further information.
The Fees Office manage tuition fee payments and charges. If you have questions about this, you can contact them using AskQM.
If you are an undergraduate student also read the above section about Student Finance England funding as Student Finance England limit the number of years that a Tuition Fee loan is available and this may not be automatically available to you for a re-take period. If the Tuition Fee Loan is not available, you will need to consider how to pay the your tuition fee yourself.
Student Finance England Postgraduate loans are also limited and and additional payments of loan are not available for a retake period.
- If you are an international student and have a student visa
You may need more time in the UK to complete your course than your current visa allows, and will need to check if you can extend or apply for new Student Immigration Permission to cover the additional time required to complete your course. You can find information about this in our international Visa implications to changes of your programme page.
Other factors to consider
As well as checking how your funding, tuition fee liability and student visa may be affected, there are some other factors to consider if you are an EU national, are a parent or student entitled to welfare benefits or will need to find work while you re-sit out of attendance.
Our Other Practicalities page has information about other practical issues including access to Queen Mary Facilities.
EU Settlement Scheme
If you hold EU Settled or Pre-settled Status and intend to spend time outside of the UK, our EU Settlement Scheme information explains how these can be affected by absences from the UK.
Social Security Welfare benefits
If you are an International student in the UK with Student Immigration Permission or as visitor you are not entitled to claim any welfare benefits as it is a breach of your immigration conditions. Students in the UK with any other type of immigration permission should always seek advice before making any claim.
The Welfare Benefit Social Security regulations prevent most full-time students from claiming any welfare benefits during their studies. This includes during any re-take or re-sit periods, including re-sitting out of attendance. However, the benefit rules do allow certain students to claim during their studies:
- Students with dependent children. For information, visit our page for Students with Children.
- Students with personal care or mobility needs and who meet the eligibility requirements may be entitled to claim a disability benefit called Personal Independent Payment (PIP) (non - income based).
- Students who already receive PIP and who claim other welfare benefits should seek advice about their eligibility to continue their claim during their studies. Further information about claiming PIP and entitlement to other benefits can be found on our Extra Money: Disability and Ill Health page.
- Students on part-time courses: At Queen Mary there are no part-time undergraduate courses but there are part-time postgraduate courses. There are no specific rules that exclude part-time students from claiming welfare benefits during a part-time course although students must meet the general eligibility rules for each Welfare Benefit claimed. However some benefits, such as Universal Credit, can require a person to be available for work and to meet job-search activities regardless of their study commitments. If these requirements are not met, a benefit claim may be refused or an ongoing claim may have sanctions applied to reduce the amount of benefit payable.
Please note that student loans, including the Student Finance England Maintenance Loan for undergraduate study and Student Finance England Masters Loan or Doctoral Loan all count as income for income-based Welfare Benefits and will reduce the amount of income based benefits payable. If you are entitled to this student funding, it counts as income even if you choose not to take it out. This income should always be declared to the relevant benefit department to avoid overpayments being made.
Postgraduate students can find further information about benefits in the Postgraduate Funding pages.
You can also contact a Welfare Adviser for advice and to discuss your circumstances.
Working
Have a look at our Working during your studies information.
- If you are a home/UK based student re-sitting out of attendance and your student funding is not available to you, you may need to consider working to support yourself instead. You may also want to increase your income regardless of your mode of study.
- If you are an international student in the UK with student immigration permission and:
- you will be re-sitting out of attendance, you will not normally be able to remain in the UK during this time as your visa/permission may be curtailed, so working in the UK will not be an option for you. Our Visa and fee implications to changes of your programme has information about how your visa is affected.
- you are required to re-sit in attendance, take a look at our page, Does my immigration permission allow me to work for information including the type of work permitted.
- If you hold a different immigration status, always check your immigration conditions permit work before taking up employment in the UK.
