Further Education Fee Policy 2024 - 2025

Defined as those studying a defined Welsh Government Learning Programme. 

All full time learners will be charged a fee of £25 at enrolment. 

Fees will be collected in advance online or at enrolment. There will be no exceptions. Enrolment will not be considered final until payment has been made. 

Once the learner enrols, refunds will not normally be given to learners who for whatever reason do not continue with their studies. 

Payment will provide learners with a lanyard and identity card to access services of the College, including the library, social areas, refectories and £25 worth of printer credits for the year. 

Lost cards will be replaced at a cost of £5. 

Other than the Enrolment Fee, there will be no tuition or awarding body registration fees for full time learners (other than reassessment/examination costs – see section 10). 

Learners choosing to enrol on additional part time courses, outside of their main learning programme, will be charged the fees associated with that course.

Defined as those not studying on a Welsh Government Defined Learning Programme. 

All part time learners will be charged fees in line with the policy. All part time FE courses will be classified into one of the bands A-V in the following table. Part time FE learners will be charged as shown below:

Learn Direct courses, Basic Skills, Essential Skills and ESOL courses up to level 1 shall be categorised as band A. 

The fees will cover the standard duration of the course and will be set accordingly (i.e. they are not always annual fees). e.g. if a course takes two years to complete the fee will cover the whole two years. 

All learners undertaking part time courses will be expected to pay and enrolment will not be considered final until payment has been made. 

No staged payments will be permitted for bands A – L. However, as the fees for bands M – V exceed £400 (the College’s minimum amount for instalment payments) these may be paid in three stages as follows: 

1/3 of registration fees payable at enrolment and Direct Debit Mandate completed at the same time for the remaining two instalments. Payments for the remaining instalments will be taken from your chosen bank account at the 3 and 6 month point after the start of your programme. 

Once the learner enrols, refunds will not normally be given to learners who for whatever reason do not continue with their studies. For help with payment see section 9. 

Staged payments are not permitted where fees are being paid by an employer or Sponsor – see section 7. 

LEARNERS UNDER THE AGE OF 19 AS AT 1 SEPTEMBER 2024 

Learners under the age of 19 on 1 September 2024, who are pursuing part time courses that are supported with funding provided by, Welsh Government, will not contribute to the cost of tuition and will only be charged a fee that covers enrolment administration and awarding body registration costs. Such learners will be charged the banded fee associated with the course or a fee up to a maximum of £25 whichever is the lower.

Higher Education learners or those on Work Based Learning enrolling on a part time FE course will be charged the fees in full.

Some specialist commercial courses may charge fees that fall outside of the bands A-V. This will be explicit in the literature for the course. Staged payments will not be permitted for these commercial courses and they are non-refundable.

Some learners never come to a College campus. The companies supporting these learners will be invoiced at agreed census points during the year, taking account of the roll on roll off nature of many of these courses. Fee arrangements for learners in the workplace may be subject to separate negotiation with arrangements agreed between the College and employer.

For online learners, an on-line payment may be made via the virtual college using the secure payment link that will be made available on the site. No access to learning materials will be given until payment has been confirmed. Specific fee bands will be applicable to online courses and these will be made known at the point of enrolment online.

Some learners will be supported by their employers. In such cases, the College will supply receipts for learners to claim the money back from their employers. Alternatively, written confirmation from an employer to invoice them directly for a fee will be accepted, but this must be provided at enrolment. Staged payments are not available on fees invoiced to Employers/Sponsors.

Fees will be collected online or through payment at each campus. Payment of fees will be expected at enrolment. Enrolment will not be considered final until payment has been made or written confirmation received that fees are to be paid by an Employer or Sponsor. Online payment services will also be provided for full time learners.

While learners cannot apply to the Financial Contingency fund to pay their fees directly, they may be eligible for help with costs associated with learning on their course, e.g., course equipment, travel and childcare. Learner Support staff will be able to assist learners with information on all sources of financial help including Welsh Government Learning Grant (WGLG) FE.

Learners can pay by: 

• Debit and Credit cards 
• Cash or Cheque 
• On line 

We regret Amex cards are not accepted.

Learners will be permitted one free re-sit for most re-assessments and examinations. Where exceptions to this exist, these will be made known to the learner at enrolment. 

Thereafter, learners will be charged for re-assessments and examinations. This will be at a rate commensurate with the Awarding Body costs associated with re-assessment or in line with consumable costs where the assessment is skills based. 

The policy will be applied regardless of whether learners are sitting paper-based assessment, examination, skills based or electronic assessments. Learners re-sitting assessments ‘online’ (after their first free re-sit) will be charged at a cost of £30 per re-assessment. 

Any additional charges levied by awarding bodies, relating to post results services (such as queries, remarking of scripts, copies of scripts, etc) will have to be met in full by learners.

Where a learner wishes to enter an assessment/examination after the closing deadline, and this has been made known to the learner well in advance, any late entry fees incurred by the College will normally be passed onto the learner.

Charges will be passed onto learners failing to attend assessment/examination, unless a medical certificate or other suitable evidence is produced. A learner simply failing to turn up will normally be charged the costs incurred by the College.

External candidates will not normally be allowed to sit examinations through the College.

Learners who do not pay their fees will be asked to leave the course. Any student completing an academic year of study with unpaid fees will not be permitted to re-enrol in the next academic year until all fees outstanding are paid in full. Failure to pay any charges made to you by the College for any goods or services provided, will result in County Court action being taken to recover the sum(s) outstanding. Third party Debt Recovery Agencies may also be used in an attempt to collect any outstanding fees, the cost of which will be added to your debt. If any of this action becomes necessary, we may use Personal information provided by you in order to conduct appropriate anti-fraud checks. Personal Information that you provide may be disclosed to a credit reference or fraud prevention agency, which may keep a record of that information.