I have had
I am referring to the online application for Student Finance. I have provided my “feedback”:
This process has been a fiasco from start to finish.
I wish to apply for the income assessed help with tuition fees and the HE Grant, so I selected “no” when the questionnaire arrived at the question “Do you wish to receive non-income-assessed support…?”. From this, later in the questionnaire, I arrived at questions relating to the non-income-assessed support. I checked the relevant question and although I was confident that I had made the right answer, I altered the answer to check whether the ensuing questions would relate to the income-assessed support. It seems that the questionnaire at this point wanted to submit my application.
There is no way, as far as I can see, that I can cancel the request (at any stage of the application) on here. So even though I have a part-filled application, there is no way in which I can be certain that the information I have entered will be deleted.
The online process has been nothing short of a farce since the online application facility was (eventually) opened. I appreciate the difficulties involved in constructing an online form as huge as this, but if it doesn’t work then the onus falls on the students in the end. This year I will be submitting my application by paper - at least I can control what goes on it and where it goes.
I apologise for this rant, but please appreciate that I cannot afford to be the result of a failed experiment.
Stick to paper, kiddo!
Most big government IT projects end in failure or with extremely poor return for what was spent on it. The government needs to stop giving contracts to these large monolithic software houses that keep on screwing up, and do some research into other, cheaper and perhaps far better companies.
I appreciate the form might be complicated, but to be honest, someone not capable of creating a slightly advanced web form isn’t a worthy web developer.
Did I mention that the design and useability of most government sites also SUCK?
Lol, tell them that!