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Original poster

To be angry and upset on son’s behalf - university admission related

94 replies

Jaspermcsween · 08/02/2019 19:54

My son applied to university on the last day allowed -
Deadline was 15th January at 6 pm .
He has an email showing his application was received by UCAS at 00.55 hours. On that date.

Today he got an email saying his application was unsuccessful.
Reason?
I t was received after the deadline.

Except it wasn’t and he has the email to prove it !

He will phone ucas and the university on Monday.

In the meantime does anyone have any advice or similar experiences?

Thanks for reading. I hope someone can help

OP posts:
Boyskeepswinging · 09/02/2019 10:19

Why leave it so late? Hope his school/university work isn’t always on the deadline because he’ll end up being stressed. Chat about this with him
This is a very good point. Your internet going down/laptop breaking/printer running out of ink are not accepted as reasons for coursework being late at uni. Late submissions are heavily penalised. This is the perfect opportunity to get him to understand this - and get him to contact the admissions team himself.

HarryTheSteppenwolf · 09/02/2019 10:27

Every year we get some applications that arrive late with a statement from UCAS saying that they were submitted on time. We process them as normal but this does require at least two people in the university to do something to make them get processed. Obviously, I've no idea how this is done in other universities. I'm wondering whether your son's application has not been picked up by someone who needed to ensure it was dealt with as an on-time application. I think he needs to talk to someone in the university's admissions office if UCAS has already confirmed the application was on-time.

lljkk · 09/02/2019 10:27

Let us know when you get it sorted, OP. X fingers it's a quick task.

Original poster
Jaspermcsween · 09/02/2019 11:49

Why leave it so late? Hope his school/university work isn’t always on the deadline because he’ll end up being stressed. Chat about this with him
This is a very good point. Your internet going down/laptop breaking/printer running out of ink are not accepted as reasons for coursework being late at uni. Late submissions are heavily penalised. This is the perfect opportunity to get him to understand this - and get him to contact the admissions team himself.

Completely agree and have had exactly this conversation with him ! Many times. He moved out a year ago and has been working. We chat often and I had asked him few times if his application was in yet, and not to leave it to the last minute. There’s only so much I can do, though.

I hope he learns from this . It goes without saying I love him dearly and hate to see him upset but he’s an adult and needs to do adult stuff .
If he has to continue working for a year it might not be a bad thing.

His dad is really angry about all this.

Thanks everyone for your support and advice. I will let you know what happens.

OP posts:
Mrskeats · 09/02/2019 11:53

Why on earth leave it till the last day? Asking for trouble and does not allow time for internet problems etc. Doesn't bode well for being a uni student when you have to work independently.
As others have said let him sort it out.

lljkk · 09/02/2019 12:01

I would bet good money that a lot of kids leave it to the last 24 hours. I don't think it's rare.

Aeonium · 09/02/2019 12:06

It seems a bit unfair tbh. If someone on their end needs to do something to finalise the application then that info should be publicised and the deadline moved earlier. Eg if it needs to be processed by 16th then set the deadline as 14th to allow 48 hours for processing on the other end. If the deadline is 6pm on 16th then tbh I’d expect to be able to press submit until 5.59pm.

It’s not like he applied at the last minute. It was about 18 hours before the deadline on a week day, you’d expect them to have picked up the application at some point during that day. Definitely contact them and complain, find out who is responsible for delaying his application past the deadline.

Mrskeats · 09/02/2019 12:15

I used to oversee admissions at a college.
It was rare.

Bluntness100 · 09/02/2019 12:18

Op, just to be sure, just after midnight is effectively a few mins after the 14th. I'm sure he's not confused on the timeline, but some people do this.

The email says 0.55 am on the 15th?

lljkk · 09/02/2019 12:22

There's a lot of advice about what to do if missed the UCAS application deadline. Suggests a lot of demand from people who need to know. Grin

I can't even find separate stats for the kids who met the mid-January deadline, only including those who made the end June deadline.

www.ucas.com/corporate/data-and-analysis/ucas-undergraduate-releases/2018-cycle-applicant-figures-june-deadline

Bluntness100 · 09/02/2019 12:23

Sorry just to clarify what I am saying, effectively the system will be programmed to only take applications from before the date. So either the program is wrong, it won't be a manual exercise, or he has got his dates wrong, ie he submitted just after midnight on the 15th, so it was the 16th,

If the program is wrong, then lots of kids will be effected, and this will be sorted. But I'd check the email if I was you.

Original poster
Jaspermcsween · 09/02/2019 12:31

Bluntness, The acknowledgment email arrived just after midnight on the 14th.
Ie right at the start of the 15th !

OP posts:
quizqueen · 09/02/2019 13:01

Hopefully, he will be accepted somewhere as he received proof of receipt by email, but may not necessarily get into his first choice of university or course. It doesn't bode well though for his strategies for getting his course work in on time! He is an adult now so it's all up to him to sort out his future. Perhaps he will learn from this experience, perhaps not. Also, a lesson for parents, to ensure their offspring become as independent and responsible as possible, as soon as possible.

alwaysreadthelabel · 09/02/2019 13:28

This is why most schools and colleges have a ucas deadline date of way before the actual deadline date. Where I used to work it was in December. This gave teachers and lecturers time to do the reference etc...... they would all then get submitted on time. You did occasionally get the odd teacher who would forget to hit submit but there was a member of staff who would log on to the system at about 5.45 and check that all fully completed applicantions had been submitted or would submit themselves if not. A safety check for the college!

I think your son needs to take this as a harsh lesson on being more organised. Some job applications close early if they have enough applicants etc..... if he leaves everything to the last minute he may miss out on a lot of stuff.

fashiondevotee · 09/02/2019 13:41

Sorry OP, I think your son needs to be more organised and take this as a lesson learned. My classmates and I had ours in months before the deadline.

TheFallenMadonna · 09/02/2019 13:51

A deadline is a deadline. If you meet it, you shouldn't be penalised.

lljkk · 09/02/2019 16:39

I found some numbers, ha!

UCAS statistics for 2017 cycle,
applicants by January deadline = 564,190
applicants by June deadline 649,700

So that's... 85510 past January deadline. 13% of final total that were late applicants. Okay rare, but not extremely so.

To be angry and upset on son’s behalf - university admission related
To be angry and upset on son’s behalf - university admission related
Bluntness100 · 09/02/2019 16:43

Then there is a program error op, and he just needs to call them he won't be the only person who has applied in the last day.

Have you seen the email?

HarryTheSteppenwolf · 09/02/2019 16:46

Why do some people here have such difficulty understanding dates?

The deadline was 18:00 on 15 Jan. An application received at 00:55 on 15 Jan was 17 hours and 5 minutes before the deadline, not 55 minutes (or 6 hours and 55 minutes, or any other number of hours and minutes) after the deadline.

Boyskeepswinging · 09/02/2019 17:01

The January deadline is only for Home and EU students and is only for the most popular courses as I explained earlier. So not all applications made after 15th January are late. And of course many choose not to apply at all until they have their results at Clearing.

Original poster
Jaspermcsween · 10/02/2019 01:45

Good work lljkk

Bluntness100 yer I have seen the email from UCAS on the 15th and also the one from the university sent yesterday saying unsuccessful as application was late

OP posts:
Original poster
Jaspermcsween · 10/02/2019 01:50

See photo

To be angry and upset on son’s behalf - university admission related
OP posts:
Bluntness100 · 10/02/2019 09:17

Then it's fine op, he won't be the only kid affected. Just tell him to call them Monday and forward them the email showing it was submitted within thr time frame, they are going to have to retook at all their admissions now.

If he has genuinely done it in thr time frame, then this is just an error and I wouldn't be concerned.

Original poster
Jaspermcsween · 10/02/2019 20:13

Bluntness100 thank you once again for taking time to give such a measured and kind reply

OP posts:
anniehm · 10/02/2019 22:39

We had the same issue with an independent application send 2 days before the deadline, still got her place (she only applied to one) but it wasn't an oversubscribed course and we knew the admissions tutor who was the one who told us he hadn't received it on deadline day (4pm) and of course you can't get hold of ucas - as she had her place it was a formality (she already had a level grades)