Worst Form Ever

This post is something between a rant and a whine, and as self-indulgent as that sounds. Do excuse me, but I've been driven to this by the Student Loans Company. Reproduced below is the most confusing, ambiguous, ill-thought-out form I have ever had the misfortune to be asked to fill in. Don't worry if you can't make out the details (if you wanted to); I'm going to reproduce the salient points in the text.

There are bad signs from the start. The request in the first block of text to enter any "amends" of name and address on the next page doesn't speak well of the English of whoever wrote this. Nor does it say much for the SLC's efficiency that it requires three separate unique identifying codes to know who I am.

But let's pass over these minor quibbles and get to the real problems. The form, as it says at the top, is one that I should fill in if I'm overseas. The second block of text says that the purpose of the form is to establish my "employment status and potential earnings over the next 12 months". With these two things in mind, consider these requests for information:

"Please give the date you left (or will leave) the UK".
"Please give the date you will resume (or resumed) UK residency".

These are very odd questions. Firstly, If I'm filling out this form, I'm overseas. So the date I will leave the UK and the date I resumed UK residency aren't relevant bits of information. If either of those are dates I can give, I'm not overseas. Secondly, if the purpose is to determine my potential earnings over the next twelve months, the date I left (and the date I returned) is surely irrelevant. Thirdly, unless I'm going to resume UK residency within the next 12 months, the date I resume it is again irrelevant. So all the information requested is irrelevant to the stated purpose of the form.

Next, I'm asked to "tick the relevant box in section A or B" to indicate my current employment status. Section A contains various sorts of employment; Section B lists things you might be doing other than working. The obvious problem is that I am both employed (A) and pursuing further study (B). So to be accurate, I need to tick a box in both sections. Not a huge issue, maybe, but it suggests that the SLC just doesn't know its clientele. Almost every UK graduate studying in the US will be in a similar position to me.

Finally, and the last straw, is section C. Here, I'm asked to give my "Total Income". Just that. What the hell do they want to know? There are (at least) four plausible options:

i) Annual income over previous year;
ii) Predicted annual income over next year;
iii) Total earnings over stay abroad so far;
iv) Predicted total income over whole stay abroad.

Additionally, for each of those options, there are two sub-options. Is the figure meant to be gross or net of local taxes? So we have eight alternatives. Absolutely no indication is given as to which I'm supposed to provide, and I can hardly work it out from the rest of the form, given how confused that is.

I'm so tempted to send the form back uncompleted, with a letter outlining all these points as an explanation for my failure to fill it in. But, since the SLC is doing its best to get militant with me, I suppose I'll make a guess at what they're after and see what happens. Really, though. What a sorry piece of bureaucratic rubbish.

Rant over. Don't get too excited, though, the next post I have planned is about economics...