Hustling for money
Students bend rules in
Student Finance Scheme
By Wylie Yeo
The financial assistance offered includes grants and loans. A grant is supposed to pay tuition fees, while a loan is supposed to support the applicant’s other expenses.
In determining an applicant’s eligibility and amount of financial assistance to be offered, the Student Financial Assistance Agency calculates the annual disposable income of the applicant’s family. The annual disposable income is calculated by dividing the difference between family income and expenditure by the number of family members.
The maximum amount of grant varies with students of different departments and tertiary institutions.
The difference between this maximum amount of grant and the disposable income of the student will be the amount of grant that can be received.
Moreover, the method of assessing the amount of a loan is different from that of a grant.
The Student Financial Assistance Agency has estimated the amount of living expenses of a tertiary student. It is confidential, and it is used to compare with the applicant’s annual disposable income.
According to Mr. Wong Chi Wa, an assistant control officer of the Student Financial Assistance Agency specializing in the Local Student Financial Scheme, the applicants’ bank accounts are the main information for assessing their annual disposable income.
Mr. Wong said, “We can identify ambiguities or tricks by experience when reading the submitted account passbooks.
“If we have any doubts on the submitted data, face-to-face or telephone interviews with the applicants will be arranged.”
During the interviews, the officials focus on verifying the ambiguities. Marks are given based on a marking scheme.
Thus, it is clear that dressing shabbily to create an image of being poor during interviews does not work.
Despite the precautions taken by the Student Financial Assistance Agency, applicants can still deceive in various means.
Submitting false or inadequate information of bank accounts is one way.
“In order to get a larger amount of grant and loan, I haven’t reported all the bank accounts of my family,” admitted Miss Amy Chan (not her real name), 19, a student of the Department of Government and International Studies of the Hong Kong Baptist University.
“In the submitted bank accounts, there should be fewer transactions of large amounts. Otherwise, the agency will suspect that you have other concealed deposits,” she said.
Miss Lili So (also not her real name) is an accounting student at Hong Kong Polytechnic University. She said, “The accounts reported to the agency and the concealed ones must not belong to the same bank.
“A certain amount of money should be withdrawn from the reported accounts regularly to simulate the concealed account, which is used for paying family expenses,” added she.
Submitting false certifications of salaries is another method of deception.
Miss Apple Wong is a 20-year-old Year 1 student in the Department of Business Administration at The Chinese University of Hong Kong. Miss Wong, who also requested that her real name not be used, said, “My father receives his salary in several cheques every month. Only the cheque of his basic salary is deposited into the reported account.”
Miss Amy Chan’s parents are working in a market stall. The owner of the stall signed a false salary certification for them.
Mr. Wong Chi Wa responded in this way: “The agency is unauthorized to check applicants’ information with banks.
“We can do nothing if applicants trick us with a whole set of documents. I can only say that they are clever.
“However, it is difficult to submit the same false set of documents year after year.”
If the agency discovers any false information in the applications, applicants have to refund the paid grant or loan immediately without any interest charged.
Said Mr. Wong: “Legal action is our last resort.”
However, no case has been brought to court in the past 2 years.
The grant and loan can lessen some students’ burden.
“I quit my part-time job after receiving the financial assistance, since I could use it for my daily expenses,” said Miss Carmen Chan (also not her real name), 23, a fresh graduate of the Department of Chinese Translation and Interpretation of Hong Kong Polytechnic University.
“I haven’t bought any expensve items. I saved the money for a 30-day trip to Europe in my third year summer vacation.”
If applicants have any complaints concerning their allocation of financial assistance, they can prepare the relevant supporting documents and call the Student Financial Assistance Agency to arrange an interview.
For the past 20 years, the scheme has not undergone any major changes. Since November 1995, the agency has been employing an audit firm to formulate methods on improving the efficiency of the scheme.
“Fairness and justice are our aims,” said Mr. Wong. “The company is employed to investigate the best way to reflect students’ financial status accurately.”
The preliminary proposal issued in January suggested cancelling the family means test. The number of grant cases was proposed to be lowered from 60 percent to a range from 18 to 50 percent.
The proposal also suggested that all students could apply for loan, but with an interest rate higher than the inflation rate. The final report will be finished later this month.
“We still have not decided whether and when we shall follow the suggestions,” said Mr. Wong.
