This guide covers the evidence that students, parents or partners need to provide to prove their identity. It also covers evidence that students, parents and partners can give us to prove their household income and marital status.

Check out our step-by-step guide on how to upload evidence to your online account!

It’s quick and easy to use your Student Finance account, watch our other ‘How to’ films for step-by-step tutorials.

If you need to provide evidence of your identity

When you apply for the first time, you’ll need to provide details or evidence to confirm your identity. If we need to see your original identity evidence, it must be valid and sent to us by post.

I’m a UK national, what can I send?

If you have a valid UK passport, you can give us details from it when you apply. If you don’t have a valid UK passport, you can:

• upload a copy of your UK birth or adoption certificate (both long and short versions are acceptable) to your online account
• send us a photocopy of your UK birth or adoption certificate (both long and short versions are acceptable)
• send us your original certificate of Naturalisation/Registration

I’m from outside of the UK, what can I send?

You need to give us details from your valid identity document when you apply. You need to give us details from one of the following:

• Passport
• National identity card
• Biometric residence card
• Biometric residence permit

If you’re an Irish citizen you need to send your original valid UK, ROI or EU passport.

If your parents or partner needs to provide evidence of their identity

You need to give us details from their valid identity document when you apply. You need to give us details from one of the following:

• Passport
• National identity card
• Biometric residence card
• Biometric residence permit

If you’re applying for student finance as the family member of:

• a UK national
• an Irish citizen
• a Person of Northern Ireland

you need to send us your family member’s original valid passport or birth or adoption certificate.

You also need to send us proof of your relationship to your family member. You need to send us one of the following:

• birth certificate
• marriage certificate

Examples of evidence we can’t accept:

• paper ID cards (this includes Italian paper ID cards)
• UK or non-UK driving licence

Find out what address you need to send your identity evidence to by visiting www.gov.uk/apply-for-student-finance/proof-of-identity

If your parents or partner are asked to provide evidence of their income

We usually don’t ask your parents or partner to provide evidence of their income once they’ve supported your application, we’ll get their details from HRMC. We may contact them to ask for evidence of their:

• marital status – if they’re separated or divorced
• income – if they’re living abroad or finalising their current year income assessment
• private pension contributions
• additional voluntary contributions.

You should only upload financial evidence if we’ve asked for it. Uploading evidence such as your P60 or Tax Return when this wasn’t needed will cause delays to the student finance application.

If you’re asked for evidence, we accept digital copies as long as they’re clear and readable. The quickest and easiest way to provide financial evidence is by uploading it via your parent’s or partner’s online account.

If you or your parents need to provide evidence of marital status

When you first apply for student finance, we may need to confirm your or your parent’s marital status; to do this we need you to give us evidence.

If you or your parent indicate that you’re single, usually we won’t ask you to provide evidence. Digital copies of evidence are acceptable as long as they’re clear and readable.

If you or your parents tell us the wrong marital status, we may need evidence before we can update your status.

Evidence to prove that you’ll be under the age of 25 years old at the start of the academic year and married or in a civil partnership

Examples of evidence you can provide to confirm your marital status include:

• marriage certificate
• civil partnership documentation

Evidence to prove that you or your parents are separated, divorced, or have a dissolved civil partnership

Examples of evidence you or your parent can provide to confirm marital status include:

• decree nisi or decree absolute
• final or conditional order
• civil partnership conditional order
• a signed and dated letter from your solicitor confirming your status
• a signed affidavit
• statutory declaration
• most recent Council Tax bill with an acceptable discount

If your or your parent’s marital status remains the same throughout your studies, we’ll only need this evidence in the first academic year of your course.

The quickest and easiest way to provide marital status evidence is by uploading it via your or your parent’s or partner’s online account.

Alternatively, this evidence can be posted to us.

Find out what address to send your evidence to by visiting www.gov.uk/apply-for-student-finance

How long it takes to process your evidence

If you’ve uploaded evidence through your online account, you can use the application status tracker to find out when to expect an update.

If you’ve sent evidence by post, this canwill take up4 to 6 weeks for us to process and update your online account.

To make sure we can process your evidence as quickly as possible, please do not contact us during this time. We’ll update your online account once it has been processed.

We can’t confirm that we’ve got your identity evidence until after we’ve processed it. This allows for quicker processing times and makes sure you get your identity evidence back as quickly as possible.

If you’ve sent your evidence by tracked delivery, you should check the delivery date with the delivery service.