Scholarships That Cover Visa Fees and Health Insurance 2026

Tuition and stipends get all the attention in scholarship guides, but the costs that surprise students most are the ones that arrive between the award letter and the first lecture: the visa application fee, the immigration health surcharge, the mandatory health insurance policy, the tuberculosis test, the residence permit fee. In the UK, a self-funded student currently pays a £558 Student visa application fee plus an Immigration Health Surcharge of £776 for each year of the visa — before dependants, who pay both charges again each. In Australia, student visa charges have risen sharply and Overseas Student Health Cover (OSHC) is a compulsory purchase for the entire visa period. These are not small amounts, and whether your scholarship absorbs them or leaves them with you can change your pre-departure budget by the equivalent of several months of living costs.

The problem is that “the scholarship covers visa and insurance” means three different things in practice, and programmes rarely spell out which one applies to you. In the first model, the charge is waived or paid directly — you never hand over the money, as Chevening scholars experience with the UK visa fee and health surcharge. In the second model, the programme gives you a general allowance that is intended to absorb these costs — Erasmus Mundus’s monthly unit cost is explicitly meant to cover travel, visa, installation and living costs, but no one reimburses your actual visa receipt. In the third model, the cost is simply yours: the scholarship is generous on tuition and stipend and silent on visa fees, which is the position for Commonwealth scholars’ UK visa and surcharge. Insurance has the same three patterns: a policy arranged and paid for you (DAAD, Erasmus Mundus consortia, Türkiye Burslari), a national scheme you are enrolled into with programme-paid top-up cover (Eiffel in France), or a mandatory scheme whose premiums come out of your stipend (MEXT students in Japan’s National Health Insurance).

This guide goes programme by programme through the official terms, so you can see exactly which model applies to your award — and budget honestly for the rest. It pairs naturally with our guide to scholarships with family and dependent allowances, because dependant visa fees and dependant health cover are almost never included even when the scholar’s own are. For the wider shortlist, start from the StudyGraduate scholarships directory.

Visa Fee and Insurance Coverage at a Glance

Read the table with one rule in mind: if a cost is not named in the programme’s official benefit list, assume you pay it. Scholarship administrators reimburse what their terms promise — not what a blog post, an agent or a previous scholar’s experience suggests. The sections below show the official wording behind each row.

Programme-by-Programme: What the Official Terms Actually Say

1. Chevening, UK — Visa Fee and Health Surcharge Waived for the Scholar

Chevening offers the cleanest arrangement in this guide. Chevening’s own guidance states that scholars do not need to pay the UK Student visa fee or the Immigration Health Surcharge: when the online visa application asks whether you hold a Chevening Scholarship, answering yes takes you past both payment stages. Against the standard charges — a £558 visa fee for applications from outside the UK and £776 per year of health surcharge at current published rates — that is a saving of well over £1,300 on a typical one-year master’s visa, and it happens automatically rather than by reimbursement. Chevening also makes a contribution towards the cost of a mandatory tuberculosis test where your country requires one for the visa application.

The boundaries matter as much as the benefit. The waiver covers the scholar only: a dependant’s visa fee and surcharge are not Chevening’s concern, and as our family allowance guide explains, Chevening provides no dependant support of any kind. The waiver also depends on you completing the visa form correctly — scholars who pay because they failed to declare the scholarship cannot expect the money back. Finally, note what sits underneath: the health surcharge is not “health insurance” in the commercial sense; it is the charge that buys access to the UK’s National Health Service, and Chevening’s exemption simply removes the charge for its scholars. Official detail: Chevening FAQs (chevening.org), and our Chevening Scholarship guide.

2. Australia Awards — Initial Visa Expenses and OSHC Paid by the Programme

Australia Awards is one of the few programmes that lists visa costs as an entitlement in its governing document. The Australia Awards Scholarships Policy Handbook (section 1.1.5) states that scholarships generally cover full tuition fees, return air travel, an establishment allowance, a contribution to living expenses, an Introductory Academic Program, Overseas Student Health Cover and initial visa expenses. Country-level entitlement summaries make the same point concretely — the Australia Awards Indonesia page, for instance, lists the DFAT student visa and student dependant visa among the scholarship entitlements for its scholars, alongside scholar-only OSHC, with recipients required to arrange and maintain OSHC for any accompanying family themselves in order to satisfy visa requirements.

OSHC deserves emphasis because it is a visa condition, not an optional extra: every Australian student visa holder must maintain adequate health cover for the whole stay, and every accompanying family member must be covered too. Australia Awards pays the scholar’s single OSHC policy; a family policy upgrade is your cost, and in Australia’s family-couple OSHC market that upgrade is substantial. Also keep the scope word in view — “initial” visa expenses: extensions, subsequent visas and family members’ applications outside the initial grant should be assumed to be your responsibility unless your Program Area confirms otherwise in writing. Official source: Australia Awards Scholarships Policy Handbook (dfat.gov.au); see also our Australia Awards guide.

3. DAAD, Germany — Insurance Paid as Part of the Scholarship; Visa Costs Not Listed

DAAD’s official scholarship database entry for EPOS lists, as a standard component of the award, “payments towards health, accident and personal liability insurance cover” — a three-part insurance bundle that DAAD arranges for its scholarship holders for the duration of funding. In Germany this matters doubly, because proof of health insurance is a condition of enrolment at a German university and of the residence permit: DAAD’s provision removes both a cost and an administrative hurdle. The monthly rates are €992 for graduates and €1,300 for doctoral candidates, rising to €1,400 from February 2026.

On the visa side, however, the DAAD benefit list is silent: no visa fee reimbursement is promised in the EPOS entry or in DAAD’s general scholarship information. German national visa and residence permit fees are modest by UK or Australian standards, but they are yours to pay, along with the cost of any document legalisation your visa requires. The correct summary is: DAAD pays for your insurance, not your visa. If a third-party site tells you DAAD reimburses visa fees, ask it for the call text — it is not in the official database entry. Official source: DAAD EPOS scholarship database entry (daad.de); compare German programmes at TU Berlin and other profiles in our universities directory.

4. Commonwealth Scholarships, UK — TB Test Contribution Only; Visa and Surcharge Are Yours

The Commonwealth Scholarship Commission’s benefit list is generous — return airfare, full tuition, a stipend of £1,712 per month (£2,000 in London) — but it does not include the UK visa application fee or the Immigration Health Surcharge, and scholars should budget for both themselves. Against current published charges, that means £558 for the visa plus £776 per year of surcharge, and the same again for each dependant in the rare cases where dependants can come at all. What the CSC does cover in this area is narrower and specific: Commonwealth Shared Scholarships include a contribution towards the cost of a mandatory tuberculosis (TB) test where one is required for a visa application, paid by the university and funded by the CSC against receipts.

This is the single most common budgeting error we see in UK scholarship planning: assuming that a “fully funded” UK government scholarship must include the visa and health charge because Chevening’s does. It does not — the two programmes are administered differently, and only Chevening scholars get the waiver. If you hold a Commonwealth offer, treat the visa-plus-surcharge total as a pre-departure cost of roughly £1,300–£2,100 depending on visa length, and keep the receipts for the TB test if you are a Shared Scholar so the contribution can be claimed. Official source: Commonwealth Shared Scholarships (cscuk.fcdo.gov.uk); see our Commonwealth Scholarship guide.

5. Erasmus Mundus, Europe — Visa Costs Inside the Monthly Allowance; Insurance Arranged by the Consortium

Erasmus Mundus Joint Masters use the second model. The scholarship is calculated on a monthly unit cost of €1,400, up to a maximum of €33,600 over 24 months, and the official programme description states that this contribution assists students in covering travel, visa, installation and subsistence costs — in other words, your visa fees for each country of mobility come out of the same €1,400 that pays your rent and food, topped by a full participation-cost (tuition) waiver. With two or three residence countries in a typical joint master’s, that can mean two or three separate visa/residence processes, each with its own fee, all funded from the allowance rather than reimbursed.

Insurance is handled the opposite way — arranged for you. Consortia are required to provide cover meeting the EACEA minimum requirements for health insurance, and consortium pages state this concretely: Mundus MAPP, for example, records that health insurance in accordance with the EACEA minimum requirements, for the duration of studies plus a margin before and after, is purchased by the consortium for all enrolled students; Mundus Journalism similarly lists free health and liability insurance for scholarship holders. So the accurate Erasmus summary is: insurance provided, visa fees on you but with an allowance designed to absorb them. Official consortium sources: Mundus MAPP financial aid page and Mundus Journalism tuition and scholarships page; see our Erasmus Mundus guide.

6. France Excellence Eiffel — Insurance Provided in Two Layers; Tuition and Visa Not Covered

The Eiffel programme’s 2026 regulations set out a distinctive insurance arrangement. On arrival, Campus France enrols recipients in a temporary health insurance plan until coverage by the French national health scheme takes effect; that national scheme (Sécurité sociale) is mandatory and free of charge for students enrolled at a French institution. Once the scholar provides proof of national-scheme enrolment — within two months of arrival — Campus France enrols them in a supplementary health insurance scheme at no cost to the recipient. The regulations add two sharp edges: the supplementary cover expressly excludes accompanying family members, and Campus France may suspend scholarship payments if proof of national enrolment is not provided by the start of the third month. University summaries of the programme describe the same package: monthly allowance (€1,200 master’s / €2,100 doctoral from January 2026), international travel support, temporary then supplementary health cover, and housing assistance.

Eiffel famously does not cover tuition fees — public-institution scholars are typically exempt from registration fees under the applicable rules, but the scholarship itself is an allowance, not a fee payment — and its regulations do not list student visa fee reimbursement among the benefits. Treat the French visa process costs as your own unless Campus France’s current call documents say otherwise. Official programme summary: University of Toulouse — France Excellence Eiffel scholarship page, which reproduces the Campus France benefit structure.

7. Türkiye Burslari and MEXT — One Pays Your Insurance, the Other Expects You to Pay the Premiums

Türkiye Burslari’s official programme pages list health insurance among the scholarship’s core benefits, alongside tuition, accommodation, a monthly stipend (6,500 / 9,500 / 13,000 TL by level in the current official structure), a one-year Turkish language course and return airfare. Because YTB also handles university placement within the same application, the administrative path to insured, enrolled status is unusually integrated; confirm any Turkish residence permit charges with YTB for your cycle, as the published benefit list emphasises insurance rather than permit fees. Official source: Türkiye Scholarships — Study in Türkiye with Scholarship (turkiyeburslari.gov.tr).

MEXT is the mirror image. The Japanese scholarship pays tuition, stipend and airfare, but health cover works through Japan’s National Health Insurance, which every resident student must join at their municipal office — and the premiums are the student’s own expense, normally paid monthly out of the stipend (many universities draw attention to this in their MEXT guidance and some offer partial premium support locally, which is a university matter, not a MEXT entitlement). Likewise, MEXT’s published guidelines do not list visa fee reimbursement as a benefit; you may see blog claims that MEXT “covers visa fees”, but we could not verify that against an official MEXT source, so budget for the (generally modest) consular fee yourself. See our MEXT Scholarship guide.

Who Pays What: The Three Models Compared

How to Confirm and Claim Your Coverage: Step by Step

1. Find the benefit list in the official terms — not a summary. Search the programme’s regulations, handbook or database entry for the exact words “visa”, “insurance”, “health” and “surcharge”. DAAD’s EPOS entry, DFAT’s handbook and Eiffel’s regulations each answer the question in one or two lines.
2. Classify each cost into a model. Waived, paid directly, inside an allowance, or yours. Write the classification into your budget spreadsheet with the official page as the source.
3. Ask the administrator one direct question. “Are the student visa fee and mandatory health insurance for my award paid by the programme, reimbursed against receipts, included in my allowance, or my own cost?” Get the answer by email and keep it.
4. Follow the waiver mechanics exactly. Chevening scholars must declare the scholarship in the visa form for the fee and surcharge to be skipped; paying by mistake is generally not refundable.
5. Never let insurance lapse. OSHC in Australia is a visa condition (condition 8501 requires adequate health cover for the whole stay); German enrolment requires insurance proof; Eiffel can suspend payments if Sécurité sociale proof is late. Diary every renewal date.
6. Keep every receipt. TB test contributions (Commonwealth Shared, Chevening) and any receipt-based reimbursements are only paid against proof.
7. Price the dependant gap separately. If family will join you, their visa fees, surcharges and health policies are a distinct budget line — see the family allowance guide and plan with the StudyGraduate budgeting tools.
8. Recheck fees in the month you apply. Visa fees and surcharges change with little notice — the UK Student visa fee rose to £558 in April 2026, and UK maintenance requirements rise again for applications from 30 November 2026. The figure in any guide, including this one, is a snapshot.

Required Documents for Visa and Insurance Steps

• Passport valid for the full visa period (and beyond, where the route requires it).
• Scholarship award letter / Confirmation of Award naming the benefits — essential evidence where a sponsor covers visa or living costs.
• CAS (UK), CoE (Australia), admission letter or equivalent for other countries.
• Insurance policy documents: OSHC policy certificate (Australia), DAAD insurance confirmation (Germany), consortium insurance certificate (Erasmus Mundus), or national scheme enrolment proof (France, Japan).
• TB test certificate from an approved clinic where your country is listed (UK route), and panel medical results where Australia or Canada requires them.
• Financial evidence for any costs the scholarship does not cover — bank statements meeting the route’s holding-period rules.
• Receipts for any cost you will claim back (TB tests, and any receipt-based benefits in your award terms).
• For dependants: their passports, relationship evidence, and their own insurance policies and fee payments.

Deadlines and Timeline

Practical Tips

• Budget the “silent costs” before you celebrate the stipend. A Commonwealth scholar heading to London needs roughly the visa fee plus a year of surcharge in cash before departure; an Australia-bound self-funded student needs the visa charge plus a full OSHC policy up front.
• Distinguish a health surcharge from health insurance. The UK surcharge buys NHS access; it is not a private policy, and it does not cover dependants unless they pay their own.
• Ask whether insurance covers the gaps that matter to you. Standard OSHC excludes most dental and optical care; Eiffel’s supplementary cover exists precisely because the French national scheme reimburses only part of most costs.
• Use official fee checkers in the filing month. GOV.UK publishes current visa fees and surcharge rates; Australia’s Home Affairs site publishes the current visa pricing table; university international offices will confirm the OSHC providers they accept.
• Do not double-insure. If DAAD or an Erasmus consortium has arranged your cover, buying a second private policy usually adds cost without adding benefits — check what the arranged policy includes first.
• Keep the scholar/dependant split visible. Almost every “covered” claim in this article applies to the scholar only. Our guide to scholarships that cover airfare applies the same discipline to flights.

Common Mistakes

• Assuming “fully funded” includes the visa. Commonwealth and DAAD awards are fully funded for tuition and living costs, yet neither lists the visa fee as a benefit.
• Paying the UK fee and surcharge as a Chevening scholar. The waiver works through the application form itself; a wrong answer converts a waived cost into a non-refundable payment.
• Letting OSHC start late or lapse. In Australia that is a breach of a visa condition, not an administrative detail.
• Missing Eiffel’s two-month deadline. Campus France can suspend allowance payments if Sécurité sociale enrolment proof is not submitted in time.
• Believing blog claims that MEXT reimburses visa fees or pays insurance premiums. We found no official MEXT source for either claim; NHI premiums come out of the stipend.
• Forgetting dependants entirely. Eiffel’s regulations exclude family from supplementary cover in so many words; Chevening and CSC exclude dependant visa costs by silence. Silence means you pay.
• Quoting last year’s fee. UK charges changed in April 2026 and maintenance rates change again from 30 November 2026 — always price from the live official page.

FAQs

Which scholarships genuinely pay the scholar’s visa fee?

Two clear cases: Chevening, where the UK Student visa fee is not charged to scholars at all, and Australia Awards, whose policy handbook lists “initial visa expenses” as a scholarship entitlement. Erasmus Mundus covers visa costs in the allowance sense — the €1,400 monthly unit cost is a contribution towards travel, visa, installation and subsistence. For DAAD, Commonwealth, Eiffel and MEXT, no visa fee benefit appears in the official terms, so budget for the fee yourself.

Is the UK Immigration Health Surcharge the same as health insurance?

No. The surcharge (£776 per year at current published rates) is a mandatory charge that gives you access to NHS services; it is not a commercial insurance policy and does not include things like most dental treatment. Students whose scholarships do not waive it — Commonwealth scholars included — must pay it as part of the visa application, for themselves and for each dependant.

Does DAAD pay for health insurance in Germany?

Yes. DAAD’s official scholarship database states that the award includes payments towards health, accident and personal liability insurance cover, and DAAD arranges this cover for scholarship holders. What DAAD does not list is visa fee reimbursement — that cost remains yours.

What health cover do Australia Awards scholars get?

The programme provides Overseas Student Health Cover (OSHC) for the award holder for the duration of the award — single cover for the scholar’s basic medical costs. Accompanying family members must also hold OSHC as a visa requirement, but arranging and paying for their cover is the scholar’s responsibility.

Does Erasmus Mundus pay for my visas to each country?

Not as a separate reimbursement. The scholarship’s €1,400 monthly unit cost is explicitly a contribution towards travel, visa, installation and subsistence costs, so visa and residence fees across your mobility countries come out of that allowance. Health insurance is different: your consortium purchases cover meeting the EACEA minimum requirements for enrolled students.

Are dependants’ visa fees or insurance ever covered?

Rarely, and only where a document says so. One country-specific example: the Australia Awards Indonesia entitlement list includes the student dependant visa for its scholars. Eiffel’s regulations expressly exclude accompanying family from supplementary insurance, and Chevening provides nothing for dependants. The safe default is that dependant visa fees, surcharges and insurance are family costs.

What happens if I pay a fee my scholarship would have waived?

Usually, you lose the money. Chevening’s waiver operates inside the visa application form — scholars who pay because they did not declare the scholarship cannot expect reimbursement. Read the administrator’s visa guidance before you open the form, and screenshot each stage if you are unsure.

Sources and Verification

• Chevening — FAQs and scholarship terms: scholars do not pay the visa fee or Immigration Health Surcharge; contribution towards TB testing (chevening.org).
• DFAT — Australia Awards Scholarships Policy Handbook, section 1.1.5: benefits include Overseas Student Health Cover and initial visa expenses; Australia Awards Indonesia entitlement list (scholar OSHC; family OSHC at scholar’s cost) (dfat.gov.au; australiaawardsindonesia.org).
• DAAD — EPOS scholarship database entry: payments towards health, accident and personal liability insurance; no visa fee benefit listed (daad.de).
• Commonwealth Scholarship Commission — Commonwealth Shared Scholarships: contribution towards mandatory TB test costs; Commonwealth Master’s pages: benefit list without visa fee or surcharge (cscuk.fcdo.gov.uk).
• Erasmus Mundus consortia — Mundus MAPP financial aid page (€1,400 monthly unit cost; insurance purchased by the consortium to EACEA standards) and Mundus Journalism scholarships page (unit cost covers visas; free health and liability insurance).
• Campus France / University of Toulouse — France Excellence Eiffel: temporary health coverage, free national scheme enrolment, supplementary insurance at no cost excluding family members; Eiffel Regulations 2026, section 5.4 (utoulouse.fr).
• Türkiye Scholarships — official programme page: health insurance listed among scholarship benefits (turkiyeburslari.gov.tr).
• GOV.UK — Student visa fees and Immigration Health Surcharge rates as published for 2026 applications (gov.uk).

Disclaimer: StudyGraduate is an information portal, not an agency, immigration adviser or scholarship provider. We never promise selection, admission or visa approval. Visa fees, health surcharges and insurance requirements change frequently and vary by nationality and route — always confirm the current charges and your scholarship’s exact terms on the official programme and government websites linked above before you pay anything.