For many years now, the National Student Financial Aid Scheme (NSFAS) has been the main agent in supporting South African students who wish to pursue tertiary studies, but who unfortunately do not possess the funds to do so.
Tracking the progress of your NSFAS application regularly is an important step in the process, as students might not always receive an email update regarding. Because of this their NSFAS application status, so it will be up to them to keep up to date by doing a NSFAS status check.
There are different NSFAS application statuses that a student might encounter as an indication of their application ultimately being deemed successful or unsuccessful. One such NSFAS application status includes the ‘Provisionally Funded’ status.
What does a NSFAS 'Provisionally Funded' Status mean?
The ‘Provisionally Funded’ status indicates that the student has, in fact, been approved for funding, but that NSFAS is still awaiting registration data from the student’s institution, after a student has registered for that academic year.
NSFAS has said, "Once the university or TVET college you are registered at submits your academic registration to NSFAS, payment will be made. Please proceed and register at a public institution for a NSFAS funded course."
Therefore, when a student sees this, they should take note that this is a positive outcome and that they have been deemed as qualifying for funding.
Despite NSFAS having funded millions of students over the years, and planning to fund even more over the coming years, it is not always guaranteed that a student will be among those chosen to receive NSFAS funding.
Requirements for NSFAS
In order to be eligible for this highly sought after bursary, students need to meet a specific set of NSFAS requirements.
These requirements are as follows:
- Applicant must be a South African citizen
- Applicant must have a combined household income of under R350 000 (for persons with disabilities they need to prove a household income of under R600 00)
- Applicant is a Sassa grant recipient
- Applicant is planning to register for the first time in an undergraduate qualification at a registered public university or TVET college
- Applicant first registered at university before 2018 and has a household income that is not more than R122 000 per year
For further information regarding NSFAS applications, visit our NSFAS page.
