Need some advise

Hi, I am 24 and because of health and personal related issues, I didn't do exams at the typical age that they do them and am instead pursuing a Foundation Diploma in Art and Design via distance learning which will be finished by next June and I am going to pursue an IGCSE in English language. I want to apply for a 2017 BA Fine art course by the deadline date in January 2017. The IGCSE English language and Foundation diploma in art and design are the minimum requirements for the course I want to get into at university.

My question is, I'm not doing nothing any A Levels (although the Foundation diploma i am doing is equivalent to two A Levels), but I have discovered that the IGCSE results for Edexcel (which is the exam board my exams would be taken with), don't come out until around the 25th of August 2017. If I applied to the university I want to go to and if I was given a conditional offer, by the time the IGCSE result came out, all the spaces on the BA Fine Art course would have presumably gone via clearing and conditional and unconditional offers?! The results for the Foundation Diploma though I do believe come out around 10 days or so around that into August but I'm not 100% sure about that. I am really confused about what I should do. Can you please advise, thanks.

You would miss out on clearing but your firm and insurance should hold your place until you got your gcse results.

What "firm" what "insurance"?

When you get your offers through ucas, you choose a 1st choice uni= a firm and a back up in case you miss the firm offer= an insurance.

I'm not doing an insurance. I'm looking to go to one specific university. So would this university really hold a place for me until the result from the IGCSE, even though that date would be 25th of August when I get the IGCSE result which is past the date of clearing and A level results for people?

Yes they would, clearing actually won't have closed by that point there just won't be many places left.

Just to clarify, the university would hold a place on the course I would apply for, for me, until I get that IGCSE result?

I know people got their A level results today and I checked the university page for the course I want to go on out of curiosity and it said when I checked in the afternoon that there were no spaces left on the course for the September 2016 start date. So can they really hold a place, obviously this would be for next year, 2017? This course at least for this year 2016 doesn't seem to be one that has an extensive clearing period. I don't think I'd be going in clearing though... so confusing.

Yes they would.

Where can I find info on universities holding courses in the way you describe?

They all would

Can you provide any articles which talk about holding a course?