Complaints and appeals

If something has gone wrong

There are two routes, because there are two different organisations involved. Complaints about this website or the advice you were given here come to the publisher. Complaints about teaching, assessment, admissions, fees or certificates go to London School of Planning and Management, and then to the awarding body.

Which route is yours

  • This website or our advice: a wrong Tariff value, a programme fact that does not match the specification, a broken page, or advice from us that you believe misled you. Route one.
  • Anything about the programme itself: how you were taught, how work was marked, an admissions decision, a fee or refund, a certificate, or the conduct of LSPM's staff. Route two. We have no power to investigate or put right any of these, because we do not deliver the programme.

If you are not sure, write to us anyway and we will tell you which route applies and, where it is LSPM's, give you the right contact.

Route one: complaints about this site or our advice

Use Enquiry form or write to CogniPath Education, Dubai, United Arab Emirates), with the page address and what you found. Factual errors are checked against the source and corrected, usually within a few days, and we will tell you what we did. Accessibility problems are handled under the accessibility statement.

If you believe we misled you, for example by suggesting a Level 3 diploma would carry UCAS Tariff points, would guarantee a university place, or was right for you when a different route plainly was, we want to know. Give the date and what was said or written. We acknowledge within five working days and reply in full within twenty; Education adviser, CogniPath Education, reviews every complaint about our advice personally. If you remain dissatisfied, you may raise the matter with LSPM, since we act as its agent and it is entitled to know how its agents behave, and, although we are based outside the UK, with Trading Standards through Citizens Advice, because we market to UK learners.

Route two: complaints about LSPM

Your contract for the programme is with London School of Planning and Management, and it is LSPM's complaints procedure that applies. You receive that procedure in full at enrolment; if you have not, ask LSPM for it. What follows is our understanding of how it works. Confirm the detail against LSPM's own document.

London School of Planning and Management
Office 7, 35-37 Ludgate Hill, London, EC4M 7JN
LSPM's website ยท +44 (0)20 3868 8831
  1. Informal. Raise it with your tutor or with LSPM's admissions team. Most matters end here.
  2. Formal. Put it in writing to LSPM. You should receive an acknowledgement and a written outcome within the timescales its procedure sets out.
  3. Review. If you disagree with the outcome, ask LSPM for a review by a senior member of its staff not previously involved. The review outcome is LSPM's final position.

Academic appeals

An appeal is different from a complaint. It challenges an assessment decision: a grade, a resubmission outcome, or a decision about malpractice. The grounds are normally that LSPM's assessment procedure was not followed, that the marking did not apply the awarding organisation's criteria, or that relevant circumstances were not considered. Appeals go in writing to LSPM within the deadline its appeals policy states, and LSPM arranges for the work to be re-examined by an assessor who did not mark it originally. This site plays no part in appeals and cannot see your work or your marks.

When the awarding organisation becomes involved

Once LSPM's procedure is exhausted, you may take a complaint or appeal to the awarding organisation that regulates your qualification. OTHM and Qualifi each publish a complaints and appeals policy and will consider whether the centre followed its own procedure and the awarding organisation's conditions. They do not normally re-mark work themselves. The programme page tells you which awarding organisation your diploma belongs to, and the awarding bodies page links to both and explains how to verify LSPM's approval.

If you believe the awarding organisation itself has failed to meet its conditions of recognition, you may raise it with Ofqual, which regulates them. Ofqual does not investigate individual grades.

Data protection complaints

Concerns about how we have handled your personal data are covered by the privacy notice, and may be taken to the Information Commissioner's Office if we do not resolve them. Concerns about data LSPM holds go to LSPM first, under its own notice.

What we do with complaints

Every complaint about this site is logged and reviewed each term. Where one reveals that a page was wrong or unclear, the page is changed and the review date in the footer moves. Where a complaint about our advice suggests we have described LSPM's programmes inaccurately, we tell LSPM as well.