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Award Payments
Every student receiving an award/scholarship needs to accept their award, which may include submitting required documentation to the Graduate Studies office. Read more on how awards are paid, adjusted and managed on this page.
Accepting & Activating an Award
For an award to be set and paid through our office, you must:
- Accept your award
- For Internal and Donor Funded awards – accept your award offer on the GA3 System.
- For Government Funded awards, such as NSERC or SSHRC Doctoral awards - you must provide our office with the agency’s award notification letter and first instalment form, as well as the agency’s acceptance form, if applicable. Once received, you must accept your award offer through the GA3 System. For CIHR Doctoral and Vanier CGS, to request the first instalment, award recipients must complete the Confirmation of Commencement form on ResearchNet. For CGSM awards, you don't need to provide any documentation to our office.
- For Other Externally Funded awards, such as Alzheimer’s Society Awards – you must provide our office with the agency’s award notification letter. Once payment has been received by our office, you must accept your award offer through the GA3 System.
- Be registered in the intended graduate program before the first day of the term
- Sign up for direct deposit, with a Canadian bank account in your goSFU account.
Learn how to set up Direct Deposit →
Payment Process
Award payments are:
- paid in lump sums per term, as per the schedule on the GA3 System (found under the My Awards tab)
- applied to your goSFU account, paying any tuition or outstanding balance. Remaining funds are transferred to your bank account, if you have signed up for direct deposit on goSFU.
SPRING 2026
| Award Must be Accepted on GA3 by | Student Must be Registered by | Funds Will Appear in SFU Student Account by the End of | Direct Deposit Refunds Available by | Cheque Refunds | |
| 1st Schedule | Jan 8 (Thurs) | Jan 8 (Thurs) | Jan 12 (Mon) | Jan 16 (Fri) | Contact student_accounts@sfu.ca |
| 2nd Schedule | Jan 22 (Thurs) | Jan 22 (Thurs) | Jan 26 (Mon) | Jan 30 (Fri) | |
| 3rd Schedule | Feb 12 (Thurs) | Feb 12 (Thurs) | Feb 17 (Tues) | Feb 20 (Fri) | |
| 4th Schedule | Feb 19 (Thurs) | Feb 19 (Thurs) | Feb 23 (Tues) | Feb 27 (Fri) | |
| 5th Schedule | Mar 19 (Thurs) | Mar 19 (Thurs) | Mar 23 (Mon) | Mar 27 (Fri) | |
| 6th Schedule | Apr 16 (Thurs) | Apr 16 (Thurs) | Apr 21 (Tues) | Apr 24 (Fri) |
Wire Payment for Refunds/Overpayment
SFU has partnered with Flywire to issue refunds for scholarships and overpayments to international students' home country. This refund method is only intended as a temporary measure for international students studying outside of Canada without a Canadian bank account. Once you arrive in Canada and create a Canadian bank account, you must enroll in direct deposit to receive future funds.
After an award has been paid into your account, follow these flywire refund request instructions. Once submitted, Student Accounts will email you for your international banking information before processing the wire transfer, which will arrive in approximately 2-4 weeks.
Flywire charges between $1.25 and $25 CAD for international wire transfers.
As per policy GP45, we are unable to wire funds to Canadian sanctioned countries.
About Direct Deposit
Students can check or update direct deposit information on their goSFU account. This is a different payment system from payroll for Teaching Assistantships or Research Assistantships. For privacy reasons, our office cannot share banking information with payroll.
If you have not signed up for direct deposit, your refund will be delayed - refund cheques are only issued once a month from the Registrar's Office.
Tuition Waivers
Students who have a tuition waiver and an award will have their award processed first, paying off tuition. Tuition waivers are generally processed in the fifth week of classes in any given term, after which the tuition reimbursement will display as a credit or refund in goSFU. Students will need to submit a refund request to Student Accounts.
SFU Tuition Waivers are paid from SFU Funds. This includes benefits for SFU employees, their spouses and dependents and university partnership agreements in which SFU pays the tuition (eg., CSC and UCA partnerships). External organizations that provide tuition support, such as Indigenous Band funding are not considered an SFU tuition waiver. Some awards and funding restrict payments to students who have tuition waivers; visit the Terms of Reference for the award you are receiving to learn more.