NUS offers a whole bunch of financial assistances, ranging from partial loan, helping you find work, bursary etc. The deadline for this year is 1st April, which is 4 days away. So don't forget that. Financial assistance application requires you to key in some stuff online. Once that is done, you have 2 weeks to submit some documents, for eg. photocopies of your IC, your parents salary slips etc. The 2 weeks start from the day you submit your application so lets say you submitted the application on 1st March when the application just started, the deadline to submit the documents will still be 2 weeks, meaning you have to submit the documents even before overall deadline of the financial assistance.
Don't fret even if you have missed the deadline. If you request properly, I doubt NUS will deny you financial assistance just because you forgot about it.
There are a few tiers of financial assistance. However they are mostly loans so don't be too happy and just apply without thinking.
Tier 1: Tuition Fee Loan (TFL)
In order to get any other type of loans (with the exception of MOE bursary I think), you need to have this. That said, the final approval date for TFL is late June. You can apply for all other financial assistance which requires this but at the end of the day you will only be approved for those financial assistance if you got approved for TFL. TFL is basically loan of up 80% or 90% of your tuition fees from either DBS or OCBC. You just need to go down to the banks to ask for the application form. TFL requires a guarantor.
Tier 2: NUS Study Loan (w/ Living allowances)
This loan covers for the remaining 10% to 20% of your tuition fees. There's also a $3600 you can apply for living allowances. You can apply for either, or both.
Tier 3: Bursary
You can apply for NUS bursary or MOE bursary during this period of time. If you wish to apply for other bursaries which open for application later, you can do so it. More often than not, you can only get ONE bursary per year. So choose wisely. I got MOE bursary though there's less money but there's less of a hassle. Apparently you need to go for sponsorship/donor talks from time to time if you chose NUS' sponsored bursary.
Tier 4: Work Study Assistance
NUS will help you find jobs inside NUS eg. Lab assistance, ushers for University Cultural Centre, manning of Student Lounge etc. I did not go for this so I don't know much details.
Tier 5: Student Assistance Loan
This is just yet another loan of $500 or $2000 (if you live in Halls of Residences).
All loans' interest starts 6 months after you graduate or the moment you get a job, whichever comes first. Therefore I recommend that people with doubts apply first, there's nothing to lose. Most financial assistance have requirements except for TFL. For more info, visit http://www.nus.edu.sg/oam/scholarships-financialaid/financialaid/financial-index.html
Note: this applies to returning students as well.
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