Before you rush to increase Home student fees, check your (hopefully not so) small print

Higher education providers should consider their student contracts and consumer law obligations in connection with any potential tuition fee increases.

•     On 4 November the DfE announced that the maximum tuition fee that higher education providers (HEPs) registered with the OfS in the “fee cap” part of the register may charge Home students would increase by 3.1% from the start of the next academic year.
•   “Fee cap” registered HEPs should not, however, fall into the trap of thinking that they are automatically free to do so for all their students.  
•  The relationship between HEPs and students is primarily governed by contract law.  The ability of an HEP to raise the fees paid by their current students – and possibly also those holding offers to enrol after September 2025 – will depend on the terms of the contract between them. While it is very likely to be possible to charge new students the new fee from September 2025, HEPs must check their terms and conditions before seeking to apply the increase to current students and must ensure that they comply with any notice provisions within them.  
• Consumer law means that this is not as simple as just looking at whether an institution has flagged that an increase in fees is possible. HEPs will need to consider carefully the exact wording they have used, and ensure that it is sufficiently clear and was provided at the right point in the application process. Students, their advisors (eg students unions) and the OIA will all be alive to this issue.  Further, non-compliance with consumer law is a potential breach of OfS ongoing condition of registration C1 and, as we have seen from recent OfS publications, may lead to referrals to Trading Standards. 

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