I had my stipend accepted as income without a problem by the Halifax. All they ever asked for was proof of ID! Abbey and HSBC also didn't seem to mind in principle. It does seem to help to have a large deposit and so a lower loan-to-value (LTV) ratio. Essentially, a low LTV means they'll get their money back if they have to reposses and sell quickly, so they don't really care whether you can afford the payments.

If you are still having problems getting a mortgage, then self-certifying is an (expensive) option, and one I would avoid if possible.

Speak to a good IFA who can search the whole market and I'm sure you'll be able to find something

yep, I'm at Bath. Once you have registered towards the end of September, you can pick up a cheque for that quarter from the student finance office. Fees etc. are paid automatically. Subsequent payments are made electronically each quarter.

You will be invited to register online at the end of Aug/begining of september. Check http://www.bath.ac.uk/student-records/getreg/index.htm for more info.

You should definately recieve the increased amount regardless of year of study. Perhaps your uni is a little slow and will make up for it next month, but it's worth talking to the student fincance people to make sure it's sorted out.

jcgrant31: When you say earn over £12k, how do they earn this? As everyone has pointed out, if this is earned income (i.e. from a job they do in addition to their PhD and not from a stipend or bursary etc) then it will be subject to income tax and national insurance contributions. They and their employers could be commiting a serious offence by not paying tax or NI.

To me, a conference paper is a 10 page or so 'mini paper', the contents of which you present at the conferencnce. I would not pay to present at a conference who did not peer review my contribution and publish my paper in proceedings with an ISSN or ISBN number so you have something to reference.

Also, The presentations tend to be of a very high standard and certainly involve more than reading out some of your paper. If anyone dared to do that I'd boo and throw stuff at them, to be honest

The basic allowance for 2006/07 tax year is £5035. This is not taxed. The next £2150 will be taxed at 10%, and the next £2151 to £32,300 at 22%. Bear in mind that any stipend you recieve for your PhD will normally be tax free and not included in these allowances. Such awards are effectively invisble to the taxman.

This may be different if you circumstances allow you to claim any tax credits. You may also have to pay national insurance contributions. Check out www.hmrc.gov.uk for more detailed info.

There's nothing like writing an abstract saying it reports on work you've not done yet for getting your backside into gear. Don't be too detailed or commital though. Personally, I favour vague, stock phrases that make my work sound more impressive than it invariably turns out to be.

Also, a month is ages. Spend most of it just doing your work and see if you come up with any ideas. Failing that, do a literature review and identify how your research will contribute.

My view is that if you're getting a load printed, you might as well get something non-commital you can use after your PhD, like "biology research" or the name of your research group. I would worry slightly about putting 'student' on it if your PhD involved contact with companies etc.

And no, I'm not joking!:

http://www.begellhouse.com/journals/708ae68d64b17c52.html

The International Journal of Medicinal Mushrooms

IMO, metioning them in the acknowledgements section if possible would be preferrable if the help with the programming was of a generic technical nature. If their help directly contributed to the results you are reporting on and was not just technical assistance, they should be listed as an author.

You could also ask said programmer whether they think they did contribute enough to the paper to be a named author.

anonGerman - I'm not a scientist, I have no data to fake just a few things that I want to make look professional, as opposed to bodged together in Office By graph I mean something purely illustrative - you know, like in management textbooks...2x2 matrix with a few blobs of colour in each quadrant, a few big fat arrows and maybe even a few words.

Will check out the fine offerings from Adobe methinks...

DJWikid - nice plan, but the problem with having a computer nerd boyfriend/girlfriend is that you have a computer nerd boyfriend/girlfriend

As for pen + paper, with my skill that would look worse than Word!

thanks, I'll check dia out, though it looks similar to visio which I think we have a campus licence for.

Anyone have any experience in Adobe Illustrator or similar?

Thanks for replies so far. I was vaguely thinking of InDesign after I saw a demo from Adobe's Senior Evangelist (now there's a job title!)

Nothing complicated or technical required...Just graphs and tables, and a few simple diagrams illustrating hierarchies etc. Nothing scientific required...my topic is more about information management. I'm just sad and read NS in my spare time

Anyone used MS Visio?