Student Account Holds

Below are descriptions of holds and instructions for resolving holds that commonly appear on student accounts. Most of the time, holds are the direct or indirect result of charges placed by departments other than SFS. For questions about any charges on your account, first contact the department placing the charge directly (such as Parking and Transportation, or the UVA Bookstore), as details about the charges are usually not provided to SFS.

Student Finance Hold

The Student Finance Hold (SFH) applies to students who have a past-due balance and do not have sufficient scheduled resources (such as anticipated financial aid, scholarship funding, a payment plan, third party sponsorship, and/or VA benefits) to cover the balance due. 

This hold prevents students from enrolling in courses for future terms and changing courses for the current term during the drop/add period. Students can review their account through SIS and can contact SFS for further information about their past due balances. Student Finance Holds may also prevent refunds to the student, including at the beginning of a term. Students with significant balances from a prior term risk being dropped from their classes at the start of the next term, and SFS communicates clearly and often with students in such a situation.

Students are advised to make payment immediately through UVAPay or to contact SFS to review payment arrangement options in order to release this hold. 

Note: Holds are released immediately if payment is received through UVAPay. Holds should be released within 24 hours if alternative payment is submitted or alternative payment arrangements are secured. 

SFS Transcript Hold

Inactive students with any past due balance on their student account and who have entered UVA Internal Collections will have a Student Finance Collections Hold (SFC), preventing them from getting their official transcript. This hold only prevents students from getting an official transcript. Students can review their "Account Activity" tab in UVAPay to see the charges and amounts that are past due and make payment to resolve the hold.

Students who request an official transcript for employment, financial aid, or military purposes, or to transfer to another University are eligible to have this hold released in order to receive an official transcript provided appropriate payment arrangements are made with SFS to resolve the outstanding debt (or with an outside collection agency if their debt was referred), or they remain in good standing with an existing payment plan. See the Student Collections Timeline for more information.

Please contact [email protected] with any collections, payment plan, or transcript hold questions.