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This Handbook is intended for students and those who advise students, or potential students, in Scotland about their entitlement to benefits. It outlines the benefit rules and focuses on issues relevant to students. It covers both further and higher education. For more detailed information on the rules, see CPAG’s Welfare Benefits Handbook.

This Handbook covers rules affecting students studying in Scotland who are eligible for support through Scottish funding bodies such as the Student Awards Agency Scotland. It does not cover the rules for students getting support from England, Wales or Northern Ireland, or elsewhere outside Scotland.

For more on how to use our online handbooks, including getting started, updating your details and using our citation and bookmarking tools, see our Help page. 

This Handbook was up to date on 1 August 2026 and is intended to be used for the academic year 2026/27. Rates of grants and loans used are those for the 2026/27 academic year. Benefit and rates used are those from April 2026. Note: benefit rates and important changes to benefits are updated each April (but not the benefit rates in the examples).

Most full-time students are excluded from universal credit (UC) and some other benefits. There is one definition of ‘full-time student’ used for UC. Other definitions are used for housing benefit, carer support payment, new-style jobseeker’s allowance and for council tax. Some students, however, can claim benefits despite being classed as full time. If you are excluded from one benefit, do not therefore assume that you are excluded from all of them. Who counts as a ‘full-time student’, or as ‘receiving education’ for UC, is explained in detail in the relevant chapters.

A benefit chart (see here) provides an overview of benefit entitlement for students. You may want to use this as a starting point to check possible entitlement and then use the individual chapters for details.

Part 1 looks at students’ entitlement to benefits. Part 2 gives a glossary of student support in further and higher education, and Part 3 considers how each kind of support affects entitlement to UC, housing benefit and health benefits. Part 4 considers other matters – council tax and benefits if you take time out from your studies.

Chapters have endnotes with references to the legal sources. Where an abbreviation is used in the endnotes or in the text, this is explained in Appendix 3 and on here. If you are appealing against a benefit decision, you may want to refer to the law. Appendix 1 suggests where you can find legislation and caselaw.

CPAG, with Scottish government funding, continues to make this Handbook available free online, and provides training, advice and information to advisers in Scotland on benefits for people who are studying or thinking of studying. Please contact Angela Toal on 0141 552 8361, or see cpag.org.uk/advising-students-scotland for details of the support we offer. If you are an adviser and have a specific query on benefits and students, contact our advice line on 0141 552 0552 between 10am and 4pm Monday to Thursday or between 10am and 12 noon on Fridays, or email [email protected].

Please send any comments, corrections or suggestions for inclusion in the next edition to CPAG in Scotland, The Forsyth Building, 5 Renfield Street (suite 4.2), Glasgow G2 5EZ; email: [email protected].

If you or your partner are pregnant or have a young child, you may be entitled to a Best Start grant from Social Security Scotland. There are three separate one-off payments available.1 These are:

• a pregnancy and baby payment of £796.65 if it is your first child or £398.35 for a second or subsequent child. You can apply from the 24th week of pregnancy until six months after the baby is born;
• an early learning payment of £331.95 if you have a child aged between two and three-and-a-half years old;
• a school-age payment of £331.95 in the year your child would normally start school.

You are eligible for these payments if you are under 18 or get a qualifying benefit. You are also eligible if you are aged 18 or 19 and someone else claims child benefit, universal credit (UC) or pension credit (PC) for you. There are no special rules for students. Qualifying benefits are:

• UC (including if you got UC in the last month and it has now stopped);
• PC;
• housing benefit.

See cpag.org.uk/scottish-benefits for more details. You can apply online, by phone on 0800 182 2222 or by downloading a paper form. Go to mygov.scot/best-start-grant-best-start-foods/how-to-apply for more information or to start an application.

The Best Start foods scheme is administered by Social Security Scotland. You can get a payment card to buy certain foods under the scheme if you or your partner get a qualifying benefit, or if you are under 18, and you are pregnant or have a child aged under three. You are also eligible if you are 18 or 19 and someone else claims child benefit, universal credit (UC) or pension credit (PC) for you and you are pregnant or have a child aged under three. If you have ‘no recourse to public funds’ and have a low income you may be able to get Best Start foods.1

Qualifying benefits are:2

• UC;
• PC;
• housing benefit.

You can get a funeral support payment from Social Security Scotland to help with burial or cremation costs for a partner, family member or friend. It has to be reasonable for you to accept responsibility for the costs, and this requires looking at factors including whether it is more reasonable for someone closer to the person who has died to take responsibility. You can apply up to six months after the funeral takes place. There are no special rules for students.

You must get one of the following qualifying benefits:1

• universal credit (including if you got this in the last month and it has now stopped);
• pension credit;
• housing benefit.

See cpag.org.uk/scottish-benefits for more information. You can apply online, by phone on 0800 182 2222 or by downloading a paper form. Go to mygov.scot/funeral-support-payment/how-to-apply for more information or to start an application.

You can get a budgeting loan from DWP to help you pay for certain items – eg, furniture, clothes, removal expenses, rent in advance, home improvements, travelling expenses, maternity expenses, funeral expenses and jobseeking expenses. If you are claiming universal credit, you must apply for a budgeting advance instead of a budgeting loan (see here). There are no special rules for students. The loan/advance is then repaid from ongoing benefit payments.

The amount of budgeting loan you can get depends on the size of your family. To qualify, you must have been getting pension credit for at least 26 weeks before your claim is decided.

See CPAG’s Welfare Benefits Handbook for details of who can get a loan and how to apply.

Local authorities administer the Scottish Welfare Fund. This comprises community care grants to help people remain in or establish themselves in the community and crisis grants for people without money because of a disaster or emergency. To qualify, you must be on a low income. You may get a crisis grant, for example, if you are on a low income and there has been a disaster like a fire or a flood, or you have lost money that you needed to live on. Students are not excluded from applying to the Scottish Welfare Fund. More information, including how to apply, is at mygov.scot/scottish-welfare-fund.