FEE-HELP vs HECS-HELP
The difference between FEE-HELP and HECS-HELP, when you fall under each, and why a Commonwealth Supported Place is usually the cheaper option.
Both FEE-HELP and HECS-HELP are interest-free, income-contingent student loans administered through the ATO. They differ in who can use them and what each one pays.
HECS-HELP
For domestic undergraduate students enrolled at a Commonwealth Supported Place. The Government pays a subsidy direct to the university, and HECS-HELP pays the student contribution that remains. The fee you see on your invoice is already discounted.
FEE-HELP
For domestic students who are not at a CSP. This covers full-fee undergraduate places (rare in public universities, common at private providers like Bond, Notre Dame and Torrens) and most domestic postgraduate coursework places.
The repayment thresholds, the indexation rules and the "rate on the whole of income" treatment are identical to HECS-HELP. The size of the debt is usually larger because there is no Government subsidy reducing the headline fee.
When you might use both
If you switch from a CSP to a full-fee course, or you start postgraduate study after an undergraduate degree, you can carry both kinds of debt. They are pooled at the ATO end as a single accumulated HELP debt with one repayment calculation. There are also lifetime limits on the combined balance you can borrow (the FEE-HELP limit), which we cover in the FEE-HELP article on the StudyAssist site.
What this means for picking a course
A CSP is almost always cheaper than a full-fee equivalent at a private provider, sometimes by tens of thousands of dollars in total. If two providers offer the same accredited program and one is CSP-eligible, the CSP option is the safer financial default unless there is a strong personal reason to choose the other.
This is general explanatory information, not financial advice.