The National Student Financial Aid Scheme (NSFAS) confirmed plans to pay R3.7 billion to universities in January 2025. This will be for the provision of allowance payments for students including those enrolled in Health Science Programmes.
NSFAS provides comprehensive bursaries and student loans to deserving learners enrolled in approved courses at universities and TVET colleges. This funding includes money for tuition and registration fees as well as several allowances.
The upfront payments from NSFAS seek to ensure that students receive their NSFAS allowances when they begin their academic programmes in 2025. The special provision for health science students is due to their academic programme commencing earlier than other programmes.
NSFAS said the R3.7 billion upfront payment is based on the 2024 academic year total amount, expected to represent 10% of the total amount paid. This means that the scheme anticipates paying R37 Billion to fund university students in 2025.
The funding is intended to cover personal care, living expenses, travel, books, and accommodation. All impacted institutions will be notified by NSFAS of any changes to the payment dates or other matters that may arise.
TVET Colleges Upfront Payments
NSFAS confirmed it will pay 20% of each TVET College’s tuition allocation for 2025. This translates to a total upfront payment of more than R640 million.
Therefore, a total amount of R641,013,350.00 is to be paid as tuition upfront to TVET colleges by the 10th of January 2025.
The Portfolio Committee on Higher Education called on institutions to submit accurate student registration data to NSFAS to prevent allowance payment delays.
The committee recommended that issues emanating from the 2024 registration period should not continue in 2025. These issues included delays in processing applications for funding, disbursements of allowances, processing of appeals and matters related to private accommodation.
They further called on the Department of Higher Education and Training to expedite the process of standardising allowances for TVET College and university students.
NSFAS Decentralisation
NSFAS confirmed that efforts remain underway to establish regional offices around the country. Four centres are to be established in, KwaZulu-Natal and Gauteng, which will also serve Limpopo, North West, and Mpumalanga.
An Eastern Cape NSFAS office will also be established along with a Western Cape office, which will also serve the Northern Cape.
NSFAS said teams will be deployed to these regions between January and February 2025. The scheme anticipates that a complete roadmap is expected to be finalised by the end of November 2024.
This initiative is aimed at enhancing accessibility and efficiency in service delivery for NSFAS beneficiaries across the country.
NSFAS Confirms End Of Accommodation Pilot Programme
NSFAS told the committee that it ended the accommodation pilot project and is now implementing the NSFAS Accredited Student Accommodation Programme.
The scheme is in consultation to discontinue accommodation disbursements to individual students. This will include accommodation disbursements paid directly to accredited or recognised accommodation providers by 2026.
