Do universities lower their grade requirements in clearing?

I keep having problems getting past the person in the call centre. I got BBD in Geography, Russian and Maths. My original offers were BBB and i was rejected by both my choices. I know that if i can get past the call centre person i'll be able to argue my case with someone higher up, but the only option i see at the moment is to initially lie about my grades just to be put through to the admissions tutors. Any advice?????

Sometimes they do, yes. Also, because you're actually talking to an admissions tutor, you're able to argue your case more and (if you're good at talking!) possibly persuade them a bit. However, don't think of Clearing as some sort of university sale; they still want candidates they think will be able to do the course. I've seen people hoping a BBB university will let them in with something like CCD. BBC, quite possibly, BCC, maybe. But dropping down four grades, very unlikely.

For a general strategy, I'd say if you were a grade off, you've got a decent shot. If you're two grades off and it's a place you're very keen on or one of the grades off was a very near miss (because you will have the opportunity to point this out when you phone up), it's worth a try. I wouldn't really bother going much below that.

WEll all the Universities i rang up with BBB requirement don't even consider me - i got ACCCa

Call centre??? Unis don't have call centres :/

When you call their clearing hotlines it's a sort of call centre with current students who i am initially speaking to.

Really? Students answer your phonecall? I haven't experienced that. Maybe you should just ask them straight away to speak to the admissions tutor ?

From my experience of clearing last year, no. Unis tend to give out more conditional offers than students they can take, if say they have 100 places, 150 conditional offers given out and only 90 make their offer what they then tend to do is shop around and try and fill those 10 spots with people who do meet the standard offer through clearing. If they then can't fill the places they'll accept people that missed their offer. My insurance choice did this to me last year, they held me for 2 days after results day 'making a decision' - what they were really doing is waiting to find someone better in clearing. They then declined me after clearing was pretty much over.

Call centre??? Unis don't have call centres :/

Usually there will be a fair few universities offering below their grade requirements as far as I understand. My brother got into a BBC course with CDE, but this was UCAS 2009 Entry so I don't 100% know if the same still happens.

I missed the offer, I met the grades but got a B in the subject they asked for an A in (by 2 UMS). No amount of discussion with them worked, they just said were 'still considering' and wouldn't release me until a decision was made. I missed clearing because of it. This was last year, aka the rush to get in before fee rise, I would say this year uni's are more likely to have lower offers in clearing as clearing won't be so busy. I definitely think my offers this year have been a lot more generous than last years were already.

If a course is available in clearing then presumably the uni will be keen to fill the spare places. Do they ever accept students through clearing with lower grades than those who went through the normal admissions process?

In which case, how do you know how far off the normal requirements you could afford to be for them to consider you or is it a case of ringing all of them just to see what they'd take?

trying to work out a plan if exams go pear shaped

If a course is available in clearing then presumably the uni will be keen to fill the spare places. Do they ever accept students through clearing with lower grades than those who went through the normal admissions process?

In which case, how do you know how far off the normal requirements you could afford to be for them to consider you or is it a case of ringing all of them just to see what they'd take?

trying to work out a plan if exams go pear shaped

Sometimes they do, yes. Also, because you're actually talking to an admissions tutor, you're able to argue your case more and (if you're good at talking!) possibly persuade them a bit. However, don't think of Clearing as some sort of university sale; they still want candidates they think will be able to do the course. I've seen people hoping a BBB university will let them in with something like CCD. BBC, quite possibly, BCC, maybe. But dropping down four grades, very unlikely.

For a general strategy, I'd say if you were a grade off, you've got a decent shot. If you're two grades off and it's a place you're very keen on or one of the grades off was a very near miss (because you will have the opportunity to point this out when you phone up), it's worth a try. I wouldn't really bother going much below that

soooo it's not necessary to apply to a ccc uni when u are predicted A*BB, cause my school told me to have 2 unis that are my grades, one aspirational and 2 back up

If a course is available in clearing then presumably the uni will be keen to fill the spare places. Do they ever accept students through clearing with lower grades than those who went through the normal admissions process?

In which case, how do you know how far off the normal requirements you could afford to be for them to consider you or is it a case of ringing all of them just to see what they'd take?

trying to work out a plan if exams go pear shaped