Bulletin for January 2025

Service Review Forums 2024/25

We're planning our 2024/25 Service Review Forums. The forums have always been well attended, and we look forward to welcoming you along to one of the events. We plan to host face to face and virtual forums. We'll send out a 'save the date' email shortly, so please look out for it.

Service launch for academic year 2025/26 – application form deliveries and 'coming soon' posters

We're currently preparing for academic year (AY) 2025/26 applications. The online application service for AY 2025/26 will be available from mid-spring. This will launch alongside paper applications.

Please encourage your students to apply online where possible. This helps us process forms quickly. To promote the online service for AY 2025/26, we’ll provide ‘coming soon’ posters for you to display in areas where students will see them.

'Coming soon' posters will be available during February. You'll be able to download and print them from the LC Services website.

We'll distribute paper applications as follows:

• all schools and colleges (excluding special educational needs) will receive 50% of the amount sent for AY 2024/25
• special educational needs schools or colleges will get the same volume of forms as before
• if we sent you less than 20 forms, we’ll no longer send you a delivery as you can download and printed them

Authorised absence - accommodation appointments and viewings

We've added a new acceptable reason for authorising absences to our EMA guidance.

It's acceptable to record an absence if your students cannot make the following appointments outside of school or college hours at the request of a local authority or local council:

• attending accommodation or housing viewing appointments
• signing accommodation or housing agreements and contracts

For full guidance on authorised absences, please visit the LC Services website:

• EMA Wales guidance
• WGLG FE guidance

Students can still apply for AY 2024/25

It’s not too late for students to apply for EMA or WGLG FE for AY 2024/25.

Students can apply online or on a paper application. Both are available in English and Welsh.

Please encourage any students you feel are eligible to apply as soon as possible on the Student Finance Wales website.

Attendance confirmations

It's as important as ever that students receive their EMA and WGLG FE payments on time. To make sure this happens, please confirm attendance for your EMA students on the Learning Centre Portal every week.

You should submit your confirmations before 5pm on a Wednesday for the previous week.

For WGLG FE students, confirm their attendance for term 2 when they've returned to study and you were happy with term 1 attendance.

You can find payment information guides on the Learning Centre Portal. Additional guidance is also available on the LC Services website:

EMA Wales guidance

WGLG FE guidance

Learning Centre Portal housekeeping and security

You should expire the accounts of any Learning Centre Portal users who no longer need access to the system.

For example, they may have left their job or changed role. This helps to maintain the security of the portal and the learner data. You can find more information on the Learning Centre Portal user guide on how to do this.

You should also be aware that only email addresses on the 'profiles' page within the portal will receive our bulletins.

Please review and update your contacts list to make sure all necessary staff are there.

Welsh Government to increase EMA household income thresholds

The Welsh Government will uplift the EMA household income thresholds. This means more students will now be able to apply.

Starting from the new academic year in September, the threshold for households with one dependent child will increase from £20,817 to £23,400. This means students in families with a household income of £23,400 or less will be eligible to receive EMA.

The threshold for households with two or more dependents will also increase from £23,077 to £25,974. Therefore, students in families with two or more dependents and a household income of £25,974 or less will be eligible to receive EMA.

Students who were previously ineligible due to their household income being too high may be eligible from September. Please encourage them to apply if they're still in study by then.

EMA and WGLG FE support desk

Our support desk team is available to answer any day to day operational questions about individual students, application processing, payments and system issues. You can contact the support desk on 0300 200 4050 (option 6 for EMA queries, option 5 for WGLG FE) or email emainfo@slc.co.uk.