CREDIT: STEPHANIE LAI
Students with concerns can grab a concern form at the FSU main office in SC2001.

The Ministry of Training, Colleges and Universities announced this month a new tuition fee payment policy that will affect new and returning domestic students attending colleges in Ontario, including Fanshawe College students, starting this fall.

Fanshawe students will be required to pay a $500 non-refundable deposit fee for the 2015-16 school year by June 15. The balance of their tuition and additional fees will be due by the 10th day of classes, which falls on September 21 this year.

While the fee is non-refundable, Fanshawe will take exceptional cases, such as medical issues, into consideration, according to Fanshawe associate registrar Frank Trovato.

The new deadline will give students an additional two to three months of work before having to pay tuition.

“Students will have much, much longer to pay their fees in the full than they did in the current process,” Trovato said. “They have until September 21, compared to June 26, to pay their fees in full without incurring any late fee.”

But some organizations are worried.

“The $500 due at the beginning of June for some colleges … might be an early time frame,” said Veronica Barahona, communications manager for the College Student Alliance, a non-profit organization that works with the government and post-secondary education stakeholders whose mandate is to improve college experience.

“Most students, if they’re starting their summer jobs, they’ll only have had a couple of pay cheques before the deadline comes up.”

Barahona says the new deadline might also be an issue for new students since some of them will still be in high school when the deposit is due.

She says the CSA wants the deadline to be fair and that the government and colleges need to take into account things such as the Ontario Student Assistance Program and summer jobs.

The organization plans to publish a complaint form for students on its website, collegestudentalliance.ca, currently the forms can be picked up at the FSU main office in SC2001.

“If they have any issues with the payment deadline, or the payment periods or the monetary amount, they can come forward to their student associations or the College Student Alliance and then we can bring that to the MTCU,” she said. “We just want to create the awareness for students.”

Fanshawe Student Union president Matt Stewart called the new policy “unacceptable,” echoing the CSA’s comments.

“We don’t agree with what they’ve done,” he said. “Unfortunately, there’s no way around it.”

Stewart urges that students who have issues with the new policy fill in the CSA’s complaint form so that the CSA, the FSU and other student organizations can lobby the government.

Stewart is also president of the board of the CSA.

Prior to the policy change, students had to pay their tuition in full in June or a minimum payment of $300. Students who opted for the minimum payment option were charged a 6.25 per cent “payment plan” on their tuition balance.