It is important that if you wish to interrupt your studies, you inform us as soon as possible. 

You should only complete this form if you have discussed the implications and options open to you from an academic perspective, and gained the approval of your supervisor / department.

You may wish to seek guidance from Student Advisory and Wellbeing by emailing them or going to their webpages.

You can also seek guidance from the Students' Union Advice Centre by emailing them or going to their webpages.

If you have not interrupted before, or have interrupted for less than 24 months in total throughout your study, you will be able to request an interruption, which is subject to the approval of your School's Director of PGR Education. However, there are particular issues that you should be aware of if you are funded, sponsored, on a student visa by Royal Holloway, or in your writing up year - see below. 

• You should request and interruption as soon as you are aware of any current or future change in your circumstances.
•  A back-dated (or retrospective) interruption will only be considered on the most exceptional grounds. It is particularly important to avoid retrospective interruptions if you are:
  • sponsored by the UKVI; the University is under a legal obligation to report any interruption for Tier 4 / Student Route visa sudents to the UKVI in a timely fashion.
  • in receipt of a studentship; it is especially important that your request is submitted promptly in order to avoid maintenance overpayments (which may arise when interruptions are approved retrospectively) and result in you having to repay large amounts of money to the University.
• Interruptions covering circumstances which are planned ahead, such as work placements, should be made well in advance.

Students who have interrupted their studies remain registered students on the University and are subject to University Regulations but do not have the right to use University facilities or receive supervision, other than occasional access to your supervisor by arrangement. See exceptions to this in the box below. 

No, students who have interrupted their studies do not have the right to use University facilities or receive supervision, other than occasional access to your supervisor by arrangement.

The exceptions are if the interruption is due to one of the following reasons:

• maternity, paternity or adoption leave
• mental health reasons
• Covid-19

In these exceptions, you will retain access to facilities throughout the whole period of interruption.

The University's Research Degree Regulations state that you are permitted to request to interrupt your studies for up to 24 months (whether consecutively or otherwise) on financial, medical or personal grounds on the recommendation of your supervisor / department. You can apply for a maximum 12 month interruption at a time.

Requests for interruption are normally only granted up to the maximum period of 24 months. Should you need to request an interruption that goes beyond this limit, this should only be in serious extenuating circumstances. Please speak to your supervisor / Departmental PGR Lead about the possibility to request this.

A student may only interrupt their studies for more than 24 months, whether consecutively or otherwise, via a Suspension of Regulations request which can be requested via the interruption form, but must be thoroughly evidenced and a full rationale for the request provided.

A period of interruption will not normally be granted during the writing up year. Interruption requests at this stage will only be considered for long-term / serious extenuating circumstances which prevent you from undertaking any work at all. Please contact us if you require any advice on this.

It is only possible to request an interruption in serious extenuating circumstances. Please speak to your supervisor / department about the possibility to request this.

A student may only interrupt their studies in their writing up year, via a Suspension of Regulations request, which can be requested via the interruption form, but must be thoroughly evidenced and a full rationale for the request provided.

It is only possible to request an interruption in serious extenuating circumstances. Please speak to your supervisor / Departmental PGR Lead about the possibility to request this.

A student may only interrupt their studies retrospectively via a Suspension of Regulations request, which can be requested via the interruption form, but must be thoroughly evidenced and a full rationale for the request provided.

You are liable to pay fees for the period you have attended prior to the interruption. When resuming your studies, your account will be credited on a pro rata basis for any fees paid in excess for the previous academic session. 

No refunds will be paid for a period of interruption and any credits on account will be offset against future year fees.

On resuming your studies, your tuition fee will be calculated based on the current year’s fee, not the fee from the year that you started the interruption, and your account will be amended accordingly.

If you are in receipt of external (Research Council) or internal (University studentships) funding, you and your supervisor should ensure the Doctoral School is consulted, and that you are aware of the potential implications of this request on both your funding and departmental/University submission rates.

It is essential that you check prior to requesting the interruption that the interruption is permitted within the terms and conditions of your funding.

If you are in receipt of either internal or external funding, please be aware that all payments will normally stop during a period of interruption.

Further information and guidance for funded students can be found here.

If you are in receipt of a loan from Student Finance this should stop when your interruption is reported to Student Finance. If you receive any payments during the period of time that you are interrupting, please be aware that you may be required to repay this. It is important that you contact Student Finance to confirm your entitlement to future funding based on your interruption.

You can contact them on 0300 100 0607

If you interrupt your studies, Royal Holloway will withdraw its sponsorship for the duration of the interruption and you are obliged by the Home Office to leave the UK for this period. Your interruption will be reported to UK Visa and Immigration (UKVI) and you will be required to leave the UK within 60 days.

You will have to reapply for a new visa three months prior to resuming your studies at Royal Holloway. The UKVI will be provided with the most recent contact details that we have recorded for you on Campus Connect. For further advice, please contact the International Student Support Office at internationaladvice@royalholloway.ac.uk.

If you are currently living in halls of residence, you will need to complete the online notice to leave form and vacate your room, as per the Licence Terms & Conditions within 28 days, ensuring that you check out at your Halls Reception. If you do not check out at your Halls Reception you will remain financially liable for the room and in all cases settlement of any outstanding financial liabilities must made in full. More information can be found on the online notice to leave form. Should you have any queries, please contact studentservices@royalholloway.ac.uk.

You need to provide any document that can adequately support the reason and duration of the interruption. For example, if the reason is medical a sick note, hospital/doctor’s letter could be provided. 

• See appendix B of the University’s Extenuating Circumstances guidance notes for advice on this.  
• All evidence must be submitted in English.
• Where applications are submitted that lack adequate supporting evidence, it is very likely that they will be denied or subject to significant delays.
• The evidence you provide should support the dates of your request.

If you have evidence that you think would be sufficient, but you are worried about sharing particular sensitive information on the document that is not relevant to the interruption reason, we are happy for you to ‘grey out’ the areas that you do not wish to include.

If your interruption request is a Suspension of Regulations (i.e. interruption of over 24 months, interruption in the writing up year or a retrospective interruption) then your application will only be considered if your evidence is robust enough to support the rationale provided on your application form.

If you are not sure what evidence is suitable to submit, please contact us for advice.

If your interruption request is approved, we will add the period of your interruption to your thesis/dissertation submission deadline, e.g. a student with a 22 September 2021 deadline who interrupts for 6 months would now have a new submission deadline of 22 March 2022.

The same logic is applied to the calculation of your upgrade deadlines, if you haven’t already upgraded.

The Doctoral School will confirm these new deadlines to you by email.

No - there is a slightly different process for requesting maternity, paternity or adoption leave.

Find out more

The interruption process for DClinPsy students is on the whole entirely the same as for all other PGRs, other than the information required pertaining to the taught elements of your programme.

Please complete the DClinPsy version of the online interruption to studies form after having checked the FAQs above, and guidance notes below.

Interruption of studies form for DClinPsy students.

If you wish to request an interruption of studies and you are eligible for this, you must submit an online interruption to studies form.

• You MUST read all sections above before completing the online interruption of study form.
• Your must contact your supervisor to arrange an appointment to discuss the details of your interruption.

The interruption form will be sent to your supervisor for academic approval.

The supervisor approved interruption form, and uploaded evidence will be sent to your School's Director of PGR Education for a decision.

If the request is approved, we will process it, update your student record and send you an email to confirm how this interruption affects your:

• upgrade deadlines (if not already upgraded)
• thesis submission deadline
• funding end date (if funded)

We will contact you shortly before you are due to resume your studies with details about the re-enrolment process. You must re-enrol within three weeks of your stated date of return. Failure to re-enrol by the deadline may result in the closure of your student record. If your record is closed and you wish to return to the University you must contact us and will manage your query, possibly re-directing you to the Admissions team.

If you wish to extend your interruption you must re-apply via a new request form, providing new evidence to support the extension, and clearly explaining in the rationale why this is being requested, and why the previous period of interruption was not sufficient or correct.

Any such request must be discussed with your supervisor in the first instance.

If you wish to return to your studies earlier than planned, you must notify your supervisor and contact us with your new return from interruption date, as agreed with your supervisor.

We will then recalculate all deadlines and fees based on your new return date and update your records accordingly. We will contact you via email with your updated deadlines.

If you are a Student Route or Tier 4 visa student, please contact the International Student Support Office at internationaladvice@royalholloway.ac.uk for further advice.

If you do not return from interruption and subsequently withdraw, the date of withdrawal is recorded as the start date of the interruption and the fee liability is calculated accordingly.

You can find further information around the withdrawal process here.