The National Student Financial Aid Scheme (NSFAS) provides comprehensive bursaries to deserving students studying approved courses at Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET) colleges and universities in South Africa.
In 2023, NSFAS received more than 900,000 funding applications from students. While many of these students were approved for funding, more than 300,000 bursary applications were rejected by the financial aid scheme.
NSFAS encouraged students to submit an appeal if their funding application was rejected. While NSFAS initially indicated that funding decisions would be finalised in February, the financial aid scheme indicated that they experienced a backlog with a large number of appeals submitted by students.
Concerned students who submitted an appeal to NSFAS have complained that their appeal applications have been stuck. Students said their appeals were stuck on “provincially funded” and have been stuck on stage 2 since January.
NSFAS CEO Andile Nongogo explained that students whose application status indicates that they are provisionally funded will be funded for the 2023 academic year. This as “provisionally funded” indicates that NSFAS is awaiting their registration information from the institution where they are registered.
Applications that are stuck on stage 2 or awaiting evolution require students to submit supporting documents. Nongogo said NSFAS is unable to process a bursary application if students fail to submit the correct supporting documents.
Nongogo revealed that delays in NSFAS delivering appeal outcomes are due to students sending random documents and photos to pass stage 2 of the application process. This prevents NSFAS from finalising its appeal application.
They added that NSFAS will continue working on finalising appeals for students. The financial aid scheme issued 20,000 responses over the weekend to those affected by academic progression.
NSFAS intends to finalise all appeal applications by the end of April 2023. Students whose appeals are successful will receive comprehensive funding from the bursary scheme. This includes tuition fees, registration fees and several allowances.
