HECS-HELP Repayment Calculator

From 1 July 2025, Australia switched from a flat-rate HECS repayment system to a marginal bracket system — similar in structure to income tax. Previously, crossing a threshold meant your single rate applied to your entire income, creating so-called "repayment cliffs" where a $1 pay rise could cost hundreds of dollars in additional repayments. Under the new system, you only pay the higher rate on income within each bracket, making take-home pay far more predictable.

The minimum repayment threshold also increased significantly — from $54,435 to $67,000 in 2025-26, and it is now indexed each year: for 2026-27 it is $69,528. This means hundreds of thousands of Australians with HECS-HELP debt make no compulsory repayments at all. For those above the threshold, each bracket attracts a marginal rate applied only to the income within that band. Your employer deducts the estimated annual repayment evenly across each pay cycle, so there is no lump-sum surprise at tax time as long as you report your debt to your employer via a withholding declaration.

In addition to the repayment system changes, the Universities Accord (Student Support and Other Measures) Act 2024 applied a 20% reduction to all outstanding HECS-HELP, VSL, SSL, ABSTUDY SSL, and AASL debts as at 1 June 2025. This one-off reduction was automatically applied by the ATO — no application required. If you had a $30,000 HECS debt, it was reduced to $24,000 before the 2025 indexation was applied.