Part-time postgraduate fee waiver

To qualify for a UWE Bristol fee waiver for your part-time postgraduate master's course or doctoral programme, you need to be:

• studying at postgraduate or doctoral level for the first time. This means that you have not already achieved a qualification at the same level as your new course. If you have a master's qualification, you can apply for a waiver for a course at PhD level
• considered a UK resident ('home') student for fee purposes, and
• registered on a designated part-time postgraduate master's course or doctoral programme that lasts for at least one academic year, and
• registered for 90 credits or fewer, and
• in receipt of a means-tested benefit on 1 September 2025 (or 1 January 2026, if you are starting your programme in January 2026), and continuously for the previous six months, or
• a care leaver or care experienced.

If you meet the above criteria, UWE Bristol will consider a waiver of 75% of your tuition fees for the 2025/26 academic year.

If you are eligible to apply for the Postgraduate Master's Loan, or the Postgraduate Doctoral Loan from Student Finance, you will not be entitled to the part-time fee waiver. You will need to provide us with evidence that you are not entitled to this funding as part of your waiver application.

The funding available for fee waivers is limited and demand is usually high. We cannot guarantee that every eligible student will be awarded a fee waiver.

Which benefits are eligible

The relevant benefits for this fee waiver are:

• Income Support
• Employment and Support Allowance (income based)
• Pension Credit
• Jobseeker's Allowance (income-based)
• Housing Benefit or Council Tax reduction
• Universal Credit
• Tax credits do not count as a qualifying benefit for the fee waiver.

Care leavers 

If you are a care leaver or care experienced, please provide evidence of your status via email to sms@uwe.ac.uk. You do not have to complete an application form.

Receiving means-tested benefits

If you receive means-tested benefits and are starting your course in 2025/26, download the relevant form for you - available here mid September 2025.

Please return the completed application form to us by email and include six months of annotated bank statements showing receipt of means tested benefits: sms@uwe.ac.uk,

Continuing students

If you are a continuing student who already receives this fee waiver, you should have already been sent an application form by email.

Existing recipients of the fee waiver will remain unaffected up until the completion of your current studies, providing you continue to meet the qualifying criteria outlined below:

• Part-time postgraduate students who have been in receipt of a means-tested benefit continuously for at least six months prior to either 1 September 2025 or 1 January 2026 (dependent on your course start date)
• Care leavers and those who are care experienced can now apply for a fee waiver without needing to be in receipt of the qualifying benefits. To qualify, you must have been in local authority care for three months between the ages of 11 to 16 and not returned to live with parents since then. If you meet this criteria, please let us know by emailing sms@uwe.ac.uk.