General Qualifications Bulletin - International - Issue 51

You can expect to start receiving your oral materials for your language oral exams and Pre-Release Material for GCE Music (9MU0/02) from 12 March onwards.

Please note that entries made from Friday 22 March will be charged the late entry fee. Further key dates are listed in the Key Dates section below.

When making entries, please remember to enter students as private candidates if they are not receiving tuition at your centre. This includes resit students if they are not receiving tuition at the time the entry is made. A candidate cannot be both internal and private at the same centre for the same series.

Entering private candidates correctly will ensure that they can receive support directly from Pearson when appropriate, for example when accessing the review of marking or appeals processes.

Following a change in process, implemented for the May/June 2023 exams, we no longer automatically supply 3D models with the modified large print Maths papers. 

Please note that these will still come as standard with all orders for UEB Grade 1 and Grade 2 braille, so you do not need to request these. 

If you have placed an order for modified large print papers for your candidate(s), then please complete this form if they require the use of 3D models. 

Failure to respond will result in no models being sent to your centre. 

If you have already completed the form for your candidate(s) then please disregard this. 

If you require any further information regarding this, please contact the Modified Formats Team at additional_requirements@pearson.com. 

As we make the final preparations for the summer series, we have a few questions for you. Please take one minute to answer this short form. 

Thank you.

Question paper security

As we head towards the May/June exam series, we’d like to remind you how important question paper security remains to the smooth running of exams in your centre and for the wider cohort. 

We have bitesize on-demand training on question paper security available for you. This training module covers the importance of question paper security, how to securely handle question papers from receiving the papers right through to returning the completed scripts to Pearson, and how to recognise and report a question paper breach. 

Cyber security

Protecting the security of your students’ data and electronic question paper materials is absolutely critical and we are committed to working with you to keep this sensitive information secure. 

As you prepare for the May/June exam series, please ensure that all staff who need it have access to Edexcel Online and have a device suitable for use with our Multi Factor Authentication app. Please also ensure that accounts have been removed for any staff who have left or moved roles and no longer need access. 

Never use the same password for Edexcel Online that you use for other systems such as your email accounts. If you see any suspicious activity on your EOL account, please reset your password immediately and report the activity to Pearson. 

Please see the JCQ’s guidance for centres on cyber security for more tips on how to keep your accounts secure.

You can also visit the National Cyber Security Centre website for a range of practical cyber security advice and best practice designed for centres. 

Question paper despatch

Looking ahead to the May/June series, here’s an update on when you will start receiving exam materials.

You can expect to start receiving your oral materials for your language oral exams and Pre-Release Material for GCE Music (9MU0/02) from 12 March onwards.

You can expect to start receiving standard and modified question papers from the following dates:

• General qualification exams taking place from 7 May and up until 22 May: from 15 April onwards
  
• General qualification exams taking place from 23 May and up until 7 June: from 2 May onwards
• General qualification exams taking place from 10 June onwards: from 21 May onwards.

You will be able to track your standard question paper despatch for General Qualifications via Edexcel Online.

If you have any concerns that your centre will be closed for the Easter holidays and you will therefore be unable to take receipt of question papers, please contact us by 26 March so that we can rearrange your delivery.

Please ensure that appropriate colleagues are aware that question papers will be arriving soon and what they need to do with them. Question papers need to be carefully checked to ensure that you have received what you were expecting and that all question paper packs are in good condition. You should report any issues relating to question papers as soon as possible.

Whilst the vast majority of question paper deliveries marked for the attention of Exams Officers are made during normal centre hours, on rare occasions, a courier may attempt delivery when the main reception has closed, so papers cannot be stored securely. We encourage centres to inform staff to refuse these deliveries, and the papers will be redelivered.

Further information, guidance and tools can be found in: 

• Sections 1-2 of the JCQ Instructions for Conducting Examinations
• JCQ-Key-Reminders-Infographic-updated-2024.pdf
• JCQ-Infographic-Paper-Journey-Final-version.pdf
• Exam Materials Receipt Log – Point of Delivery
• Exam Materials Receipt Log – Exams Officer 
• An interactive training session on question paper security is available on our on-demand e-Learning page.

The yellow label service will be in place for this summer series for centres in England to return scripts. Please read the yellow label service guidance for exams officers on the government website.   

Attendance registers

You can expect to start receiving attendance registers and labels from 16 April onwards.

Availability of electronic copies of question papers

Our goal is to ensure that your centre's exams run as smoothly and as stress-free for centre staff as possible. To help us achieve this goal, we would appreciate you making checks outlined below well ahead of your centre's first exam.  

If your centre requires access to electronic copies of question papers in the May/June 2024 exam series, for example if you make a very late entry or need to print onto coloured paper, they will be available to download on the Secure Download Service (SDS). This also includes audio files and transcripts for listening exams. Our recommendation is that a minimum of two members of centre staff have SDS included in their Edexcel Online (EOL) profile.

If your exam staff do not already have SDS added to their EOL profile, they will need to contact us, and be available to receive a secure call-back from our Customer Services Specialist on your centre's main telephone number. Once this call has been performed successfully, access to the SDS platform will be added to their account.  

Please see the Secure Download Service (SDS) support guide for further details.

If you have centre exams staff without access to SDS, they should contact us as soon as possible, and well ahead of the Summer exam series so that we can update their account.

It is important that all exam staff can access SDS as we will not be able to send electronic question papers via Secure File Transfer (SFT) on the day of the exam without a secure call back to your centre’s main telephone number first. This could result in logistical challenges for your centre at a critical time in the day - with staff required to move between an exam hall and your reception/ exam office. This may result in delays, including potentially impacting the start time of the exam in question. To avoid this please make checks to your exam staff EOL profiles (and specifically SDS) today. 

Accessing electronic copies of question papers

After consultation with Awarding Organisations, JCQ have now revised their timings for when electronic question papers are made available to centres, whether by Secure File Transfer or Secure Download Service.

These updates can be viewed in the JCQ Instructions for Conducting Examinations booklet.

This has now been increased from 45 to 60 minutes before the published exam start time.

We have also updated our Secure File Transfer (SFT) and Secure Download Service (SDS) guidance to reflect this change. 

Exam start times

Our exams are delivered at the same time all around the world. The sessions are based upon a UK morning (a.m.) session and an afternoon (p.m.) session. You need to check the correct start times for exams in your country. 

You must deliver your exams according to the examination start time guidance detailed on our Exams timetables web page. The examination start times documents give the start times for all exams by country/time zone for each series. You need to check the start times for your region for the summer series. 

Please note that for the East Africa, Middle East, South Asia and Asia-Pacific regions, there are separate documents for UK exams and our international exams.

There are some permitted exceptions to exam start times, as detailed in sections 7 and 8 of the JCQ Instructions for Conducting Examinations.

Where a timetable variation is used, candidates must be kept under examination conditions until the end of the scheduled exam time. Centres must ensure that invigilators have been trained on supervising candidates under clash supervision arrangements. More details can be found in section 7 of the JCQ Instructions for Conducting Examinations.

Exams for AS Maths, AS Further Maths, A level Maths, A level Further Maths, A level Statistics, and International A level (IAL) Maths must not be moved to an earlier session – more information can be found in the JCQ guidance and on our support page.

Instructions for conducting exams

If you are running examinations in 2024, it is important for you to stay up to date with the official exam regulations.

The JCQ have published the 2023/24 version of their Instructions for Conducting Examinations (ICE) document. We’ve also included this and links to all other regulatory documents in our support article that includes the JCQ ICE, BTEC ICEA and general regulations.

Our Key Dates Finder enables you to find all of the key dates for Pearson general qualifications and subjects in one place. Here are those taking place during January 2024.