Dear All,
It's been a long time since I've been on this forum!
Just wanted to post the outcome of my dispute with the SLC, see thread below:
Loan given to student aged under 18 - do I have to repay it?
I actually made a formal complaint against them in January as, not surprisingly, they never responded to any of my requests for information. The SLC did not follow-up on my complaint for 5 months, until I noticed they were taking money from my salary, and I again initiated the complaints procedure over the phone. But the legal team was always 'unavailable' to speak to me. It got to point where they would promise someone would phone me 'later in the day', I would wait for their call, but they never called back.
Eventually, even the student adviser (who tried, for 5 hours, to get someone 'senior' to speak to me over the phone), noticed their behaviour, and could not suggest anything, apart from turning to an external body for advice.
I then made it clear that I was going to make a complaint to an independent assessor, but also insisted on speaking to the manager of the legal team. I was not going to allow them to continue their unprofessional behavior. Since I also had the names of the individuals who were avoiding me, I wanted to complain to their manager. I must say that it helped to have the student adviser 'on my side' as he really tried his best to help me.
Two hours later I got a call from a SLC customer services representative, who 'apologised' on their behalf, and said that I would hear from the legal team within a week. I replied that was all very well, but their 'promises' really meant nothing to me, as their past behaviour proved: "The SLC was happy to leave the situation unresolved, whilst taking money from my account".
However, this time I obtained the name of the solicitor was looking into my case, and the personal phone number of the customer services manager. So I had someone to bother directly if they failed to respond within a week
Anyway, to cut a long story short, here is an email I received from them yesterday:
"Dear ****
ART ID:****
I am writing further to your telephone conversations of 20 and 21 May 2008.
Our Legal and Compliance Manager has reviewed your account and I can advise you as follows:
A separate agreement is entered into for each year of a course, and loans taken out for different years of a course should therefore be treated as separate loans.
You therefore received four student loans. Your loans for Academic Years 1998/99, 1999/00 and 2000/01 were entered into before you were 18. We can find no evidence that these loans have been ratified by you and therefore repayments will not be sought at this time. These loans will remain on our system however, and must be ratified by you if you wish to take out any future student finance.
It is clear that your loan for Academic Year 2001/02 was entered into after you were 18. There is a clearly enforceable agreement in respect of this loan. I will send you a copy of your 2001/02 loan application for your information. If you are earning over the ICR repayment threshold repayments are due and should be collected on this loan.
Any student loan repayments that are being deducted from your income are correct and should continue until the balance of your 2001/02 loan, plus interest, has been repaid.
I am sorry for the length of time that it has taken to respond to your
query of 25 January 2008, and I hope that this now clarifies matters for you.
Yours sincerely
Customer Assistance Team"
So what you think of their response? I really don't understand what is meant by "separate loan agreements for each year".
Should I agree to this, or should I verify that their information is correct?
Anyway, at least this is some progress, so I would encourage anyone who the SLC is 'ignoring' - please don't give up, because if they are ignoring you, it probably means they don't have a case to argue.
SLC response - they agree they have no evidence, but would still like some money back.. 
