Does anyone actually work at Lincoln University? I am the parent of a prospective student currently deciding which universities to apply for. She would like to study Fine Art. On the course details page (https://www.lincoln.ac.uk/course/artartub/) it states the entry requirements include this:

“Applicants will also need at least three GCSEs at grade 4 or above, which must include English”.

Are Lincoln university aware that GCSE students will typically study English Language AND English Literature? Ie, two separate subjects / qualifications.

Given that my daughter achieved a grade 6 at English Language but only a grade 3 at English Literature, we wanted to clarify the vague statement on the website and see which English course they are talking about. Or whether it doesn’t matter.

A simple task I thought. Oh no, I couldn’t be more wrong. My email of 14/11/23 received an auto reply thanking me for my enquiry and giving a reference number of 00039492, so I know my question was received. 3 weeks later though and this is still unanswered.

A week after I sent the email and correctly assuming that I wasn’t going to get a reply, I phoned the university on their ‘Applicant Enquiries’ number (01522 886644) obtained from their Contact Us page. Two things about this:

1. No one was able to take my call and I had to leave a message. This in itself is no great issue but rather than the greeting saying something along the lines of, “Thank you for calling Lincoln University, there is no one available to take your call right now, please leave a message”, I got something like, “You’ve reached the voicemail 4463, please leave a message after the tone”. Absolutely no reference to where I was calling. Ridiculous. I actually called back to double check I hadn’t misdialled.
2. As this was indeed the correct number I left a message. The first part was to express my dismay at the unprofessional greeting and then to run through the initial query that was not answered via email.

You probably won’t be surprised to learn that I haven’t had the courtesy of a reply to my voicemail message either.

Unfortunately we live in a world of terrible customer service and as first impressions go, this was awful. If Lincoln’s attitude to their communications is representative of them as a whole, then I fear for the students.

Needless to say, my daughter won’t be going here.