I'm two weeks into my PhD now, and I'm having serious doubts/concerns with regards to the provisions at the University I am at. Having come from a very good department from my subject, I suppose I have high standards, but I still believe that the set up here is just not adequate. Especially when I am choosing to do this PhD purely because I enjoy the subject, rather than for some sort of career progression. I feel I deserve to be a bit selfish with regards to the quality of the department I find myself in.

I chose to do this PhD because of the supervisor, and I have to admit she's been faultless. My title here really does interest me. However, I don't think that's enough to suffer three years in a sub-par department when I KNOW there is better out there.

Has anyone had any luck transferring institutions? If this is impossible, as I'm guessing it probably is, how easy is it to drop out and pick up funding somewhere else at a later date? I'm worried I'm going to really struggle to get onto another place/get funding if I get labelled a drop out, even if I'm not dropping out because I can't handle the research - that's the bit I'm enjoying!

I looked into changing university a few years ago, after my supervisor moved 500 ways ago. My funding council (AHRC) has provision for this, but the impression I got was that it would only be supported in extreme circumstances. There were also big questions over whether the other university would have accepted me as an incoming student.

As for picking up funding again it can be done. I'm on my second funded PhD, originally being funded by EPSRC 15 years ago, but having to leave a full-time PhD after falling seriously ill long-term. But when I applied for funding the second time I was asked to declare past funding I had received. You can fib about this, but I wouldn't recommend it. I explained why I'd had to leave the other PhD (extremely good reasons), and why the second would be more successful (boiling down to being part-time this time). Plus of course EPSRC->AHRC is one heck of a switch.

I would have thought your better option would be to try to improve the support you're getting at your existing university. Best to talk to your supervisor about this. At the very least you should talk to them about your concerns, and if you're considering switching.

I've already spoken to my supervisor, and other people within the faculty. They're sympathetic, but can't offer me anything else. The problem is that I've come from a University that has a large department purely devoted to my subject, and I've moved to a multi-disciplinary department where I am the sole representative of my subject. My supervisor's argument is that learning to work in a multi-disciplinary context is a very good life skill, but my counter argument is that I'm doing this PhD because I enjoy doing research in my subject. And I'd much rather be doing that somewhere that offers a large amount of learning opportunities in my subject.

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Fair enough. Next step then I suppose would be to see whether changing funding to another institution is at all feasible. It varies depending on the funding source. You're going to have to make detailed enquries about this, and you should do so very quickly before getting too far into your current institution.

Good luck!