Help and advice
Money, advice and support
Financial Help
We have a range of bursaries and hardship funds in place to help you if your financial situation is affecting your ability to study. They don’t need to be paid back and can help with the cost of things such as IT equipment, accommodation, travel, childcare, living costs, additional course costs and other unexpected outgoings.
Our Success for All Fund is available to help students in financial difficulty. So if your financial situation is affecting your ability to study, please apply for help.
When you apply to the fund we’ll make an individual assessment based on your circumstances and a review of your supporting documentation. If successful, we’ll award you funds that contribute to the level of support you need.
Jobs
For part-time jobs available to help you gain experience and earn money whilst studying, check out Career Zone.
You can find on campus and local part-time jobs on Handshake, the jobs portal. They’ve also got general advice on part-time jobs and specific information for International Students.
They also have details of paid internships open to our students and recent graduates.
Visit the Career Zone in The Forum, Streatham Campus, and follow them on Instagram @uoecareerzone for the latest updates.
Budgeting help
Managing your Money
The Students' Guild advice team can help you tackle the fear and worry about managing your student finances and covering your bills, with practical and useful information and advice for you. Contact the advice team.
Managing your money - podcast
The Students' Guild Advice team provide their top tips for managing your finances at Uni in this podcast. Listen on Apple or Spotify.
Debt advice - Step Change
We’re working with the UK’s leading debt advice charity, Step Change, to provide you with free, impartial and personalised support with your money and debt worries. If you’re worried about debt, it can be tempting to ignore the problem and hope it’ll go away on its own. But waiting often makes things worse – so it’s best to get help sooner.
You can get help
- Online: use the online debt help tool to get advice now.
- By phone: call 0800 138 1111. Lines are open Monday to Friday 8am-8pm, and Saturdays 8am to 4pm. Please use their budget form before calling.
Wellbeing
The rising cost of living is making it harder for everyone to balance their finances. Worries about money can be extremely stressful and affect your wellbeing and mental health. According to Student Space managing your emotions around finance can be an important step in taking control of your money. Find out more here.
If your finances are affecting your mental wellbeing our wellbeing services can offer support and guidance.
You can also get free, independent and confidential advice and support on a variety of issues from your Students' Guild Advice team.
Beware of scams, cons and fraud
Unfortunately, some criminals try to get money from students, particularly our international students. Some of these scams will seem very convincing and persuasive and it can be frightening. If you’re contacted by someone and it seems unusual, unexpected or just odd, please end the call/communication. If the person who contacted you is genuine they won’t mind you checking and then getting back to them.
• Don’t give your bank account details to anyone unless you know and trust them.
• Be very cautious of unsolicited offers of easy money. If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.
• Be wary of ads that are written in poor English, with grammatical errors and spelling mistakes.
If you believe you have been involved in a scam, immediately inform the Police by calling 101. You should also report the incident to Action Fraud and to your bank if money is involved.
New to paying tax? Beware of tax scams.
If you’re working alongside your studies, be aware of tax scams to protect yourself and your money. Criminals posing as HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) may contact you offering a tax refund or to tell you your National Insurance number has been used in a fraud. Make sure you’re on your guard. Find out more about tax scams and how to report them, on the HMRC website.