Wondering if any teachers/exam officers or just people with experience of A level remarks could offer some advice...
DD got results on Thursday, she got four Bs. She was very disappointed with this because she was predicted AABB and her uni offer was AAB. The uni have actually accepted her anyway but she is still upset about results.
On close inspection of UMS marks for each module and adding up marks we have found she is four UMS marks off an A overall for media, as her A2 coursework and exam were both 3/4 marks off A grade and she got As in exam and coursework last year. We are considering a remark for this subject in the hope it may be bumped up four marks and therefore an A overall.
For her English language it's a bit more complicated. She was hoping she would manage an A overall and worked out that if her coursework and exam were both near full marks she would do it. The coursework is one mark shy of an A but the exam has been graded a C. DD is shocked by this because she was predicted an A and she did lots of revision and practice, she felt that she was well prepared and thought the exam went really well, in fact she says it was her best exam. She answered both questions fully, spent the full hour on each of them, used plenty of terminology/theories/context etc, brought out lots of language features in the text and yet it has come out as 77 ums which is a C grade, and not even a high C, it's only 5 marks in. She can't understand this as she just can't believe that what she wrote would be graded that low. Obviously she knows the mark scheme and as part of revision looked at examiner reports and example essays so she knows what sort of thing you have to do to get a decent grade and she can't believe that what she did could be a C. The only thing she can think of is that she could possibly have picked out too many things to discuss and therefore the analysis may not have been as detailed as it should have been, but this still should not warrant such a low mark.
So she is wondering whether there could have been some sort of mistake in the marking or perhaps a clerical error as it just seems strange. She has approached college for advice but they are not very helpful - her tutor is on annual leave until next week and the exams officer simply sent her a form to fill out in an email with instructions to send it back with money, but didn't really offer any advice about the process.
Our concern is that marks can go down as well as up, although DD says that because media is so near an A it's not going to go down to a C, and the English would have to have been really bad for it to get put down any further so it's likely that whatever happens she will still be left with at least the four Bs. It's a lot of money though - we're looking at over £100 for the two remarks (thinking of requesting the english exam script as well) and it's a lot to pay for it not to change.
She does have her first choice uni place and its a RG so I think she should just leave it but she is upset that she didn't reach her personal goal and she really feels that for the amount of work she's put in she deserves better - I can vouch for that, she has definitely had many late nights writing out long coursework essays (which have mostly been A grades) and doing revision so it's annoying to have missed out on A grades by a few marks and a weird exam. She says there are people on her course with A* and As and she doesn't feel good enough to go to uni now and can't really get excited about it!
I am happy to pay the money but I suppose I just want some advice about how the remarking usually works - I've heard they have changed the rules this year, so could this have an effect? Does it sound like it might be worth it to go for the remarks/how likely is it that grades will go up?
For media she is four UMS off the A grade, for English she would need an extra 34 UMS overall but if the C grade exam is wrong that could happen. There are options to just get scripts back or do a clerical check first but this could end up costing more if we then go for the remark, plus more time. Not sure whether it's best just to go for both remarks straight away? 
Also, if any overall grades did go down, say she ended up with three Bs and a C, would she have to inform uni that she has been accepted to and would this cause her to loose place?
Any advice or experience would be greatly appreciated! 