Replying to your offers

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How and when to reply to your offers

If we have received decisions from all of your choices and you have at least one offer, we will send you a letter which will ask you to reply to your offers. You reply online using Track.

There are different rules for replying to Route B art and design courses. Route B courses are easy to identify - the course code always starts or ends with an E. Please check the art and design section for more information and see below to find out how to reply.

Points to remember when replying to your offers

• Make sure that both the course and the university or college are right for you because you will be spending the next three or four years there.
• We recommend that you attend open days or visits before you make your decision, but remember to reply by the deadline. If you are visiting a university or college after your reply date, please contact the university or college for advice.
• Think carefully before you decide which offers to accept because once you accept an offer, including an insurance offer, you are committed to that course.
• You may not want to wait for all your choices to make their decisions. If you are certain about which offers you want to accept, you can cancel all outstanding decisions and reply to the offers that you have received on Track.
• If you are replying to a joint conditional offer, for example, for a degree and HND, you are replying to the whole joint offer. You cannot accept part of the offer at this stage. When your examination results are published, the university or college will decide which part of the offer is most suitable for you.

Replying to your offers

You must reply to each offer in one of the following ways.

• Firm acceptance (F)
• Insurance acceptance (I)
• Decline (D)

Firm acceptance

If you firmly accept an offer, it means that this is your preferred choice out of all the offers you have received. As this is your first choice, you can only make this reply once.

If you accept an unconditional offer (UF), you are agreeing that you will attend the course at that university or college and must decline all other offers. We will send you a letter which will have instructions about how to contact the university or college to confirm your place.

If you accept a conditional offer (CF), you are agreeing that you will attend the course at that university or college if you meet the conditions of the offer. You can accept another offer as an insurance choice.

Insurance acceptance

You can accept an offer as an insurance choice if your firm choice is conditional. Your insurance choice can be conditional (CI) or unconditional (UI) and acts as a back-up to your firm choice, so if you do not meet the conditions for your firm choice but meet the conditions for your insurance choice, you are committed to that course.

The conditions for your insurance choice do not have to be lower than your firm choice, but be aware that if you're not accepted by your firm choice, it is unlikely that you will be accepted for an insurance choice that requests higher grades.

You don't have to accept an insurance choice - if you don't meet the terms of your firm choice but do meet the terms of your insurance choice, you are committed to taking up that place. So, if you're not sure about any of your other choices, you're not obliged to accept one as an insurance option.

Decline

Once you have decided which offer to accept firmly, and which (if any) to accept as an insurance, you must decline all other offers. If you do not want to accept any of the offers, you may decline them. You will then become eligible for Extra or Clearing, depending upon your circumstances.

There are four combinations of offers and replies

UF only - You have firmly accepted an unconditional offer. You cannot have an insurance choice.

CF only - You have firmly accepted a conditional offer.

CF + CI - You have firmly accepted one conditional offer and accepted another conditional offer as an insurance.

CF + UI - You have firmly accepted a conditional offer and accepted an unconditional offer as an insurance.

How and when to reply to your offers

Use Track to reply to your offers. Your reply date will be displayed on Track and printed on the letter we send to you. If you do not reply by the date given, your offers will be declined. The reply date is your individual reply date so it may be different to other people's. This is because it is based on when you received the last decision from your universities and colleges.

If you live in the UK or European Union (EU), the dates are:

If your postal address is outside the EU, you will have a different date to reply by.

Replying to Route B art and design courses

There are some important differences to remember when replying to Route B courses.

• If you receive an offer for a Route B course, your reply date will usually be 14 days after the offer has been made (or 21 days if you live outside the EU). Your reply date will be displayed on Track. If you do not reply by the deadline, you will lose the offer.

• If you accept a Route B offer, either as a firm choice or an insurance choice, remember that we will cancel any other Route B choices you have made.

As with other courses, you must reply to a Route B offer in one of the following ways.

• Firm acceptance (F)

• Insurance acceptance (I)

• Decline (D)

If you have applied to choices through Route A and Route B and are still awaiting one or more Route A decisions, you will be able to reply initially to a Route B offer with a Keep (K). This means that you do not have to accept or decline the Route B offer until you have received decisions from your Route A choices. Keeping a Route B offer will cancel any subsequent Route B choices. Once all decisions have been received you will have to make your final replies by the deadline stated on Track.

Replying to both Route A and Route B courses

If you have applied for choices in both Route A and Route B, you can accept two offers, but you can only accept one offer in Route B.

If you firmly accept an unconditional offer for either a Route A or Route B course, you cannot accept any other offer.

Examples of accepting offers:

Withdrawing your application

If you decide to withdraw completely from the UCAS scheme, please tell us as soon as possible and no later than 20 September 2008 so that the course(s) can be offered to someone else. We will let your chosen universities and colleges know that you have withdrawn.