Student loan repayments and pension income
Student loans aren’t only a young person’s issue. Plenty of borrowers are in their 40s, 50s or beyond, and some are already drawing a pension. So it’s worth knowing how retirement income interacts with the loan.
Pension income counts
For student loan purposes, HMRC uses your total annual income. GOV.UK says that includes income you get from:
- a workplace pension
- a private pension
- the State Pension
You only make repayments if your total annual income, including your pension, is above your plan’s repayment threshold. The thresholds this site uses for 2026–27 range from £21,000 (Postgraduate Loan) to £33,795 (Plan 4). See how much will I repay? for the formula.
How it’s collected
If you have a salary, repayments are taken from it through payroll as usual. If your income comes from other sources, how repayments are collected depends on your circumstances, so ask the Student Loans Company or HMRC how yours will work. For people who file a Self Assessment return, HMRC works out repayments from it. See student loan repayments if you’re self-employed.
The age-65 write-off for older loans
Two older loan types are written off at a given age rather than after a fixed number of years:
- Plan 1 loans first paid before 1 September 2006: written off when you’re 65.
- Plan 4 loans first paid before 1 August 2007: written off when you’re 65, or 30 years after the April you were first due to repay, whichever comes first.
Everything else follows the fixed periods in when does my student loan get written off? Those can run past retirement age, so a late-career borrower may still be repaying while drawing a pension.
Should you overpay near retirement?
Not automatically. If the loan will be written off before you’d clear it, extra payments mainly move money to the government early. If you would clear it, weigh the interest saved against what the money would do elsewhere, and remember that an overpayment can’t be refunded. See should I overpay my student loan? and consider speaking to a financial adviser, as GOV.UK itself suggests when you’re unsure about extra repayments.
Source: GOV.UK, Repaying your student loan.