Child Benefit Loan
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Borrow from £300 up to £600
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Use your Child Benefit to repay a loan
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Save little and often to build a nice pot
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Interest of 42.6% APR
Spread the word!
Child Benefit is an easy and convenient way to repay a loan, even if you are on benefits or have a low income.
Our Child Benefit loans are far better value than buy-now-pay-later, doorstep or payday lenders and loan sharks.
More than 60% of our members agree that:
- applying to Kent Savers and setting up the HMRC payment are very easy!
- a Child Benefit loan has helped reduce anxiety and stress caused by personal finances.
Sign me up!
If you receive Child Benefit for at least one child under 15, you can apply for a Child Benefit loan of £300 to £600. These have a fixed interest rate of 3% per month (APR 42.6%).
Repayments are over 1 year; in that time you build a savings pot and can access any spare balance to withdraw.
That’s it – you may repay your loan at any time, plus making loan repayments will help to improve your credit score as reported by the credit reference agencies.
Loan cost illustration
The average value of loan that we grant is set out here, with monthly repayment and savings amounts. These figures are for illustrative purposes only, as an indication of the potential total cost of a loan with us.
We won’t charge you any upfront or late payment fees, ever. In this example, the total cost of the loan (i.e. interest payable) is £128.
When you apply, we will provide you with the amounts that are specific to your application:
How to apply
Apply online in 4 easy steps:
Step 1
Apply online, it’s simple! We’ll need to see your recent bank statements – click the Open Banking option when applying
Step 2
We review your application within 3 days; if approved we’ll email you a Credit Agreement to review and digitally sign
Step 3
Contact HMRC to nominate your Child Benefit to be paid to your new Kent Savers account
Step 4
Once HMRC has sent us your first Child Benefit payment, we send your loan money by BACS to your bank account or Engage account
How do I nominate my Child Benefit to be paid to Kent Savers?
Get in touch with HMRC in one of these ways. Have your National Insurance or Child Benefit number ready. Give them Kent Savers’ account details and make a note of the Child Benefit reference number they give you.
Ways to contact HMRC re Child Benefit:
Online: sign in using Government Gateway to report a change of bank account details
Webchat: Mon – Fri 8am to 8pm, Sat 8am to 4pm
Phone: 0300 200 3100
Post: HM Revenue and Customs – Child Benefit Office, PO Box 1, Newcastle Upon Tyne, NE88 1AA
Quote Kent Savers’ details:
Account Name: Kent Savers Credit Union Ltd
Sort Code: 60-83-01 Account Number: 20239149
Reference
HMRC will allocate this using your Child Benefit reference.
FAQs
Who can apply for a Child Benefit loan? Anyone living in Kent who receives Child Benefit in their own name and with one or more children under 15.
Please check your eligibility to apply for a loan, and what Kent Savers looks at when making an approval decision.
You will need an income of £125 a week (or monthly equivalent) or more from salary, pension and/or benefits (excluding Housing benefit). We ask that you join as a member and commit to save at least £2.50 per week/ £10 a month.
We assess each application individually, taking into account income, expenditure, credit score/history, and whether we think you can afford the loan repayments. See our Loan Terms & Conditions for more information.
That’s fine. We require you to open an Engage Card Account. Your Child Benefit payments from HMRC are paid into your Share account and then allocated in this order:
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- Paying down your Kent Savers loan instalment
- Saving £2.50 per week (more if you wish) into your Save As You Borrow account, which you can access once your loan is fully repaid
- Any remaining amount from your Child Benefit payment is available to top up your Engage card account or any other account you hold with Kent Savers. This is done every week or 4-weekly.
You can use your Engage Card to access any balance on it or make a withdrawal from your Kent Savers account as usual.
We don’t return benefit payments to personal bank accounts.
Loan repayments are still due if you no longer receive Child Benefit during the term of your loan. Failure to make scheduled loan repayments will lead to arrears action, may incur additional costs and may affect your credit score. Details are found in the terms and conditions of a loan agreement with Kent Savers.
We’d like that. You can apply online to Top-Up your Child Benefit loan once you have repaid 50% of your original loan. You can track the balance of your current loan through our Members Area. The minimum Top-Up for a Child Benefit loan is £200 and the maximum loan at any time is £600.
You may only have one loan with us at a time, so your existing loan is repaid by the Top-Up first, then the rest of the balance is available to you.
You can apply for as much Top-Up as you need, subject to affordability, credit checks and our current loan limits.
You can have one Kent Savers loan at any time. If you want to borrow more than £600 you can apply for a Personal Loan instead of a Child Benefit loan, and still choose to repay it directly from Child Benefit payments by HMRC in the same way as above.
We need to see your bank statements to assess the past 90 days of your relevant income, benefits and expenditure. The easiest way to do this is by giving us read-only access to your bank statements through the trusted Open Banking link we will give you. You can instead provide downloaded or scanned bank statements but this will take extra time to process your loan application.
Yes. As part of your membership and/or loan application process, we may carry out certain checks on you with Experian, Equifax and/or Transunion (the credit reference agencies or ‘CRAs’).
Please see our Data Protection & Privacy Notice and Use of Credit Reference and Fraud Prevention Agencies documents – together, these set out how your personal information may be used when you apply to join or for a loan or are a member with us.
If a search reveals something that you have not declared to us, we will decline your loan application.
Yes. Your credit history is essentially information about the past, although we also consider your current situation, such as:
- Do you have sufficient income to cover your current commitments?
- If you have other debts, have you put in place a repayment plan with those creditors and been making payments to them?
Being able to say “yes” to questions like these will improve your chances of being offered a loan with Kent Savers. Please check if you are likely to be eligible for a Kent Savers loan.
Our APR for Child Benefit loans is 42.6%.
The most common reasons for this are:
- The total you already owe to other lenders makes a further loan unaffordable
- Concerns about whether you can afford the repayments for the amount of loan applied for
- Unpaid loans that you have with ourselves or other lenders, which may or may not be in default or have had a court judgment entered against them
- HMRC does not pay Child Benefit to you directly
If you are overstretched, a further loan might only put pressure on you. Instead, consider contacting one of these reputable agencies for free advice on how to improve your circumstances or for help with looking through your finances, to identify any additional benefits available or expenses you can reduce or eliminate.
When applying for a loan with us, it’s important to get all supporting information back to us as soon as possible. We will close your application if it remains incomplete after one month, or you decide to withdraw.
Check your credit reports to understand information held on you that is available to lenders when you apply for a loan.
Try checking your credit record for free on Credit Karma and ClearScore, or contact each of the CRAs below as information that each holds on you may differ (they may charge you a small fee for a copy of your report):
- Transunion, Consumer Services Team, One Park Lane, Leeds, West Yorkshire, LS3 1EP or call 0330 024 7574 or email consumer@transunion.co.uk
- Equifax, Customer Service Centre, PO Box 10036, Leicester, LE3 4FS or call 0800 014 2955
- Experian, Customer Support Centre, Nottingham NG80 7WF or call 0115 8286738 or email customerservices@uk.experian.com
Build up your credit score by, for example:
- Keeping a well-maintained credit card (staying well below the credit limit and paying off in full each month)
- Having some household bills in your name and paying them on time.
- Ensuring you are on the electoral roll at your current address.
- Being aware of your finances, your credit reports and correcting any errors.
- If you pay rent, report your rental payments to Credit Ladder, to recognise timely and full rental payments within your credit records held with Experian and Equifax.
When applying to Kent Savers for a loan, it may help if you:
- Are listed on the electoral roll at your current address.
- Set up a direct debit or standing order to Kent Savers and make at least one payment into your savings account before applying for a loan.
- Receive benefits, arrange for one of your benefits to be paid into your savings account with Kent Savers before applying for a loan.
- Establish a pattern of payments into your Kent Savers savings account to demonstrate that you can afford regular payments.
- If you have a partner and you are going to include your partner’s income as part of your loan application, we recommend that the application should be made by the partner with the largest income.
Benefits Calculator
Benefits can be a great help to make ends meet, repay your loans or even start building a rainy day fund and save for your retirement. We will explore how you can get the most out of your benefits and also help you to find out what you can claim. Calculate how much you are entitled to.
