The Student Loans Company (SLC) is overcharging almost 80,000 graduates by ten per cent every year – leaving them £580 out-of-pocket each time. Automatic income contingent repayments (ICR) begin when a graduate begins to earn over a certain amount of money once they complete their studies. The repayments are collected through the UK tax system where borrowers remain in the UK. However, as the SLC only receives information from HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) about what customers have repaid once a year – after employers have finalised their annual tax returns – there is a ‘time lag’ which means thousands of people nearing the end of their repayments overpay, unless they opt for payment by direct debit. http://www.independent.co.uk/student/news/student-loans-company-is-overcharging-almost-80000-graduates-by-580-every-year-baker-tilly-finds-10431230.html

Hello all, I'm here to put some focus on the troubles faced by graduates these days but I think they are just another category affected by the fall out of a bitter recession. However, this does nothing to ease the grief of leaving full-time university education and there's no where for you to go, apart from back into it for another two years in the hope you'll have a better chance of getting a job. What really stings me is that years ago you could pretty much ask for what you wanted re employment and wages following and MSc in some of the top areas like the sciences and engineering. Now, there's absolutely nito opportunity and it really is disgusting! However I feel worse for those leaving school who'll have the most energy and enthusiasm for life that they'll ever have and there's no where for this to be channeled. Instead they'll most likely grow angry and resentful of the country which does not reward anyone by providing opportunity and direction, or their hard work and achievements. People are responsible for this - the tories throughout their existence for one because the rot started with Thatcher for sure. However only God knows why they were voted in during the 90's to carry on ruining the country. These people do not represent the ordinary working person of this country like myself and my ancestors of whom all were working class. The do not represent me because they took away all that the working classes created, a first class rail network which now costs more to run than they expected to save by fu*king it up in the 60's. Not to mention the loss of ship building, engineering and many other areas which would have provided much more than revenue alone, opportunities for the younger generations of whom would inevitably grow up and need to work. Now some young people grow up to be problems for society, or they leave with 18K plus debt like me and no way of shifting it anytime soon. People really need to have a good think, preferably beyond the end of their nose and apart from what they're told by the media, before they go to the voting booths. Yes labour didn't do that great after Blair left but how will a set of banker politicians help the situation? Also we have at least one bank under state ownership, all the others should be too, considering the majority of the uk population aren't millionaires, so this may benefit us.