If you have the Right of Abode or Indefinite Leave to Enter/Remain (ILE/R), you are considered as settled for the purposes of all four UK countries’ fees and student support regulations.

If your passport describes you as a ‘British citizen’, then you also have the Right of Abode and are, therefore, settled for the purposes of all four UK countries’ fees and student support regulations.

If you have the right of permanent residence in the UK you can be considered as settled; but there are exclusions and you should check each category carefully.

Non-EU EEA and Swiss nationals, and their family members, who acquire the right of permanent residence in the UK will do so under the UK Government’s extended implementation of EC law. These people are settled in UK immigration law but will not generally qualify under categories which require settled status, because such categories usually require that the right of permanent residence has been acquired under EC law-only (ie they do not include those provided for by virtue of the UK’s extension to that law).

Scotland's fees and Student Support regulations include people with the right of permanent residence under their definition of ‘settled’.

For England, Wales, and Northern Ireland, in the fees and Student Support regulations, people with the right of permanent residence are covered under their own category. The exception to this is for those non-EU EEA and Swiss nationals, and their family, who have the right of permanent residence under UK law. These people are included where the regulations make reference to being ‘settled’.

You do not have settled status if:

• you have a time limit on the length of your stay in the UK, as shown by your current immigration permission, ie you have a 'limited leave'
• you are exempt from immigration control, eg you are living in the UK as a diplomat or a member of their household/family
• you have a type of British passport that does not give you British citizenship, eg British National (Overseas).