Always Check to Make Sure Your Scores Are Received

[GreenEyedTrombonist]

So, I thought I'd share my situation as a lesson for any future applicants. 

Last week, I received an email from one of my schools to let me know they were missing my 3rd LoR and my GRE scores. This was a courtesy email, since the app isn't officially due until January, but it caused a bit of panic in me. Why? Because I sent all my GRE scores on October 4th and it's now December. Ultimately, this took a lot of back and forth with both the school and ETS until ETS told me they needed the school to contact them before they would resend the scores. I have yet to hear back from the school since sharing this with them.

This also got me worried about my other programs. I sent the scores so early because one of my apps had an internal early deadline to be considered for early funding. I checked all of my apps and two others did not list GRE scores at all. This means there is no way for me to know, from my application status page, if they were received.

So, I contacted one of the schools. They let me know this morning that the scores were not received. I let them know what ETS said and emphasized that the scores were sent 2 months ago. They promised to double-check and then follow up with ETS. So, I contacted the final school and am still waiting to hear if the scores are missing there. And yes, that school is the one that had the early deadline, so if they're missing, there's (likely) no chance for that additional funding.

In short, always double-check and follow up if you don't see your scores posted to your app within a week or two (or haven't received a confirmation from the school). If the school can't find them, ETS will not send them again until the school contacts them directly.

Also in short, I'm very stressed right now. I'll try and let you all know how this works out.

[TakeruK]

Definitely good advice to check in the online status pages to ensure everything was received! I sent reminders to do so on my calendar.

Just a note (hopefully would reduce your stress): My middle name is a single name but it is two words, properly punctuated with a space in between. It's not an English name so to an English speaker, it does look like two foreign names but it would make no sense to separate them in my language (made up example: Ke Vin). Sometimes it gets written as one word (Kevin), sometimes hyphenated (Ke-Vin) and when it comes to middle initials, sometimes it's "K" or "K-V" or "K V" (again this is not actually my name, but just an example). Sometimes they think the second part of my middle name is my last name. Anyways, as you can imagine, when the computer system gets a score report with these 4 words (my first, middle and last name), there are plenty of different ways it can be parsed and separated. Often, it is done wrongly so it gets flagged as being unable to match with an application on file, so a human has to take a look and figure out what went wrong. This led to some online portals being delayed in updating the status. In one example, it never updated the status at all! When I inquired, the tech desk help person said that the online system only updates to "received" if the computer was able to auto-match: manual intervention doesn't trigger an update for some reason.

[GreenEyedTrombonist]

@TakeruK Hopefully the software we'll get more sophisticated and stop such issues from happening.

In my case, I have 4 legal names, but used to have 5. My scores are listed under my 5 names rather than my current 4. Even though I listed my previous name on all of my apps, I suspect this is the reason that the computers had issues automatching. What made it worse, the first school repeatedly told me they had no way to find it if it didn't autoconnect to my app and they wanted me to resend my scores. But if the name doesn't change, how would sending my scores a second time result in any type of change on their end? x]

Good news though, the third school got back to me today and confirmed they have my scores, so at least that won't keep me from potential extra funds if I get into that school!

[MarineBluePsy]

I had a similar issue during my application season.  I disclosed my legal name change on all of my applications and explained that my GRE scores and transcripts were under my former name.  Well guess what?  Several schools didn't connect anything and marked my applications incomplete.  Thankfully I was following up weekly and spotted this early (and repeatedly!) throughout the process, but it took a lot of phone calls to get it squared away when it really shouldn't have.  

[GreenEyedTrombonist]

Yep, it sucks @MarineBluePsy and you would think, if you disclose the name change, it shouldn't be an issue.  On the plus side, I'm down to one school looking for my scores and I have confirmed they were received by the other 6.

[GreenEyedTrombonist]

Final Update: The schools were able to locate my scores and everything is good on that end.  

[songofgallifrey]

I am currently having this problem with one school, and I am growing increasingly nervous that my application will not be looked at because they still do not think they have received my scores.

In November, I sent my scores to several schools. The application portal for one school was still showing their status as not received in the middle of December, but I thought it was just because the application deadline hadn't passed yet. After another week of waiting, I contacted the department's academic coordinator to ask if this was just a processing delay or if there was a problem with receiving/matching my scores. I confirmed multiple pieces of information with the coordinator (registration number, email address, etc.), who seemed convinced that I had done something wrong and had not sent my scores.

Since the holiday break I've followed up a couple of times with no reply. They kept saying that they would contact IT to see if it was a problem on their end after I had confirmed each piece of information, but don't appear to have done so. I've contacted IT myself, as well as the IT folks from the company that runs the online platform, and I either haven't gotten a reply or have gotten an entirely unhelpful answer (e.g. applicants must send their scores directly from the testing company using xyz institution code... which is what I already did!). I also contacted ETS directly to confirm that they were sent to the correct institution code and received on x date and everything.

I'm getting so frustrated, and I don't know what other options I have other than to sit around waiting for someone from the department to contact me. I may try calling today instead of emailing to shake things up. I have a standard first middle last name combination without any unexpected spaces or hyphens, and I've never changed my name, so I don't understand how it could be so difficult to match my scores to my application. Also, several other schools figured it out with no problems! Thanks for the space to vent, and I hope it will work out for me as it has worked out for all of you.

[GreenEyedTrombonist]

*hugs* @songofgallifrey it's a horrible situation when you do everything right and the schools still can't find your scores. I think a lot of it comes down to overconfidence in their computer software leading to less human oversight and an increase in the assumption that the applicant did something wrong. Hope it works out for you soon!

[songofgallifrey]

thank you for your kind words @GreenEyedTrombonist I hope I'll have good news to report soon

[songofgallifrey]

they finally matched my scores manually, thank goodness!!