Oxford with one missed grade?

It really depends - as you've already heard, it does sometimes happen. It happened to me too But one should never count on it happening for oneself, as it it's not the norm. There are no policies per se: everything is done on a case-by-case basis. For example, my tutor took me in without the right grades, but he refused to do that for someone in the year above, or 3-4 years after me! So it's all rather whimsical...

If you find on results day that you've missed your offer, call the admissions tutor for the college that has made you the offer. They'll have received your results a few days before and will have already contacted the tutors for your subject to ask what their decision is. So if the answer is a solid 'no' from your college, there's no point begging the admissions tutor - they're just the messenger!

Good luck to all of you and try not to worry about these things too much

Is it your tutors that decides i.e your DoS, or is it the main admissions tutor?