Eligibility
To be eligible for a VET Student Loan, a student must:
1. be an eligible student
2. be studying an approved course
3. be studying with an approved course provider
4. apply to the government using the approved form, which will be managed through your provider, and
5. submit Progression Forms to confirm your ongoing engagement with your studies and continue accessing the loan throughout your course.
To be an eligible student, you must meet ALL of these criteria – further detailed below.
● You are:
○ an Australian citizen, or
○ a qualifying New Zealand citizen, or
Note: A qualifying New Zealand citizen is a New Zealand citizen who meets all of the following:
■ holds a special visa category, such as the New Zealand Special Category Visa (SCV)
■ has been usually resident in Australia for at least 10 years;
■ was a dependent child when he or she was first usually resident in Australia;
■ has been in Australia for periods totalling 8 years during the previous 10 years; and
■ has been in Australia for periods totalling 18 months during the previous 2 years.
○ a permanent humanitarian visa holder, who is usually resident in Australia.
● Your HELP balance (the amount of your HELP loan limit you have left) is more than $0. This means you have enough HELP loan limit remaining for your proposed studies to be covered by the loan. The HELP loan limit is the limit on how much you can borrow.
● Any borrowing under FEE-HELP, VET FEE-HELP, VET Student Loans and, from 1 January 2020, HECS-HELP will count towards your HELP loan limit.
● You are enrolled with an approved course provider in an approved course and have enrolled in accordance with the application requirements.
● You are studying the approved course primarily at a campus in Australia.
● You have been assessed by your approved courseprovider as academically suited to undertake the approved course on the basis of either:
○ providing your Australian Year 12 Certificate; OR
○ providing your International Baccalaureate Diploma Programme (IB) diploma OR
○ providing a copy of a certificate showing you have been awarded a qualification at level 4 or above in the Australian Qualifications Framework (where the language of instruction was English); or at a level in a framework that preceded the AQF and is equivalent to level 4 or above in the AQF, OR
○ displaying competence at Exit Level 3 in the Australian Core Skills Framework in both reading and numeracy through an approved Language, Literacy and Numeracy test.
In addition, your approved course provider must reasonably believe you show competence in completing the course.
● You meet the Tax File Number (TFN) requirements.
● You have a Unique Student Identifier(USI) or are otherwise exempt.
● You have given the required documents to your approved course provider and submitted the loan application form by the first census day no less than two business days after enrolling.
If your qualification is from overseas, then the certificate provided must be a letter or certificate issued by a Federal, State, or Territory government agency which assesses overseas qualifications and which shows your qualification has been determined to be equivalent or comparable to a qualification in the Australian Qualifications Framework at level 4 or above.
To see if you are likely to meet the eligibility requirements, check out the VET Student Loans Eligibility Tool on the My Skills website.
