Hardship fund
This means-tested funding aims to help students complete their studies while in financial difficulty.
Hardship Fund applications will close on Friday 12 December 2025 at 1pm, and re-open on Tuesday 6 January 2026, in order to prioritise support before the winter closure period. This is as advertised under “Closures” that the Hardship Fund is closed for prolonged University closures periods.
About the fund
Hardship Funds are intended to be the last resort for students in financial difficulty. Please think carefully before applying, making sure you have taken into account all options available to you, such as income from work, savings, benefits, and speaking to third parties to discuss payment plans etc, if relevant.
The Hardship Fund can only assess for support towards your living costs. It cannot help with tuition fees. If you have any tuition fee concerns please contact Student Receivables as soon as possible.
You may also find these services helpful:
- The Students' Union can support you with advice if you need to speak to your landlord about potentially delayed rent payments, as well as other housing advice.
- Step Change offer free, impartial debt advice
- MySurrey Employability and Careers support
- Centre for Wellbeing offers wellbeing support and information, including out-of-hours external support.
Applying for financial support
Applications are checked for accuracy and audit, however, they are only seen by relevant staff and fall are under the University policies of storing and processing data, including in regards to confidentiality.
In order to apply you will need to provide the following, so we would strongly advise you prepare these documents to upload before you start your application:
- Supporting short statement explaining the financial issue
- Evidence of funding/how you are financially supported
- Current balances for all accounts, including home country
- Last month of bank statements for all accounts, including home country
- Evidence of the issue, if specific.
The above is mandatory, and unfortunately, if it is not provided, we cannot proceed with your application.
You will be required to enter details of a valid UK bank account during the application process. If you do not have a UK bank account please contact the Hive via MySurrey Help If you have any queries about this process and wish to speak to a member of the Student Money Advice team via MySurrey Help.
To apply please go to your Student Self-Service, and select Funding, and then Hardship Fund application.
Processing
As per the notification you will receive when submitting your application, applications can take up to 28 working days to process, as long as all information has been provided. Please note, if approved, payment may take a further 7 working days. We do aim to process applications as quickly as possible, however it is important to set expectations of our timelines, especially during busier periods.
It is important to note that an application does not guarantee an award, and you may be offered information and guidance if we cannot financially support. You also have the option of ongoing information and guidance while you are a student, if that would be beneficial, regardless of the outcome of your application.
Closures
Please note the Hardship Fund will close during prolonged scheduled University closures (winter and spring closure - see key dates), and re-open again after these closure periods.
During those times we would advise reaching out to local authority support and signposting.