Case Summaries

The provider rejected the student’s complaint. 

The student complained to us because they didn’t think the provider had properly taken the issues they’d experienced into account. We partly upheld the student’s complaint (we decided it was Partly Justified).

We decided it was reasonable for the provider to have rejected the student’s complaint about online services because there was no evidence to show that the student had been impacted by any disruption.

We decided it was unreasonable for the provider to have rejected the student’s complaint about library resources. The provider had acknowledged that the course reading list had not been supplied to its library and some arrangements for managing students’ access to books was limited. The provider said that the student could access free inter-library loans and that there were other resources the student was able to access for free. However, in this instance it was reasonable for the student to expect that the books on their course reading list would be available within their own provider’s library. While the provider had already taken steps to ensure that materials on the course reading list would be available in the future, we thought the provider should’ve offered an individual remedy to the student for the issues they’d experienced. 

We also decided it was unreasonable for the provider to have rejected the student’s complaint about issues related to their dissertation proposal. The provider had accepted that the student didn’t receive feedback and that approval of their proposal was delayed because the tutor was taking part in industrial action. There had also been unreasonable delays in the provider’s handling of the complaint.

To put things right for the student we recommended an apology and £1,000 in compensation for distress and inconvenience. We also made a good practice Recommendation for the provider to review the way it had dealt with the complaint to avoid similar delays in the future.