No responses yet - i'm in the process of crafting my letter to the Prof. in charge this evening. They do mention that they have to encourage students to submit on time to avoid getting hassle from the funding bodies. it will be interesting how strict the funding bodies are about tolerating late submissions. I suspect that they won't be in the business of restricting funding to unis on the basis of 3 weeks out of a study period of 36 months. Mark - thanks for your response; however, i think demon_x_slash has it right when he says that they don't have to alter their service to me one iota as a result of my 3 week delayed submission. That's what makes the full GBP 400 charge seem so unreasonable. I will contact the funding bodies tomorrow to ask what they would do to an institution if they permitted one of their students to submit 3 weeks late.

Hi Battleaxe/JonCris, The university have conceded that the charge is a penalty fee, used as a deterrent. When i asked for a break-down of the expenses incurred by my late submission, they were unable to provide any details. I can well imagine that they genuinely have no idea of these; in fact, i would bet that they haven't figured out any costs of this nature, e.g. for accounting purposes (of the sort that would be used in the private sector e.g. GBP 25 to send out a penalty letter, GBP 125 for costs of administering the penalty case). They have very strict guidelines with regards to extensions, namely a death in the family etc. or unemployment. This is another daft point as they clearly state that full-time employment is not a reason for an extension to be granted. I accept that they have to try and incentivise their students to submit their theses on time, but the all-or-nothing nature of the full term's part-time fees as a penalty regardless of how long the thesis was overdue strikes me as being unfair. If it is a semi-arbitary choice of penalty, that they admit does not cover any of the costs of accepting a late thesis, then i think it is wrong of them to impose it. As i have explained earlier, i don't believe there have been any costs associated with my late submission. none of my colleagues that did submit on time have had their vivas yet, just as i haven't. we have all been waiting since sept/oct for the university to deal with the choices of external examiners nominated by our supervisors. i bet that my late thesis did exactly what the on-time theses did, namely sat in a pile for a few months while the painfully slow beaurocracy crawled through the procedures. It strikes me as an inappropriate juxtoposition of extremely harsh penalties for a 3 week submission delay coupled with very slow, typically inefficient internal university procedures for submitted theses. The question is, will the legal argument used to force the banks to lower penalty fees be applicable in higher education...i'll let you all know when i get my response from the professor in charge of setting the penalty.

hi omicron - no it isn't the university of lincoln, somewhere further south. joncris - i had a final email reply from the administrator involved in billing me who conceded (after i had asked for a breakdown of the charges) that the charge was solely a penalty charge meant to act as a deterrent to late students. I know many people have replied saying that it is important to be punctual etc. and in the real world one has to be expected to make deadlines...I totally agree! I only got advance warning of this penalty in July 2006 - approximately 10 weeks ahead of the submission deadline. (ok, so the information was available online before that , but unfortunately i didn't think to look -the subject had never come up before). Given i'm working full time starting a career, 10 weeks is not a lot of time with which to implement some sort of accelerated thesis-writing initiative! Anyway, the key point i think is that the university has conceded that this penalty is purely a deterrent, and does not reflect any costs of administering my late thesis (btw, my colleagues who did submit on time are no further through the viva/exam process than me). Do forumites think that this alters the nature of my case, i.e. can the same argument as used to force the banks to reduce their late-payment penalty charges be used in this instance? BTW, my next plan is to write to a professor at the college in charge of this penalty system, and failing that , to take my case to the Office of the Adjudicator in Higher Education (i forget if that is the precise name).

Hi Blacksheep. thanks for you comments. I'll try and answer them... External examiners claim expenses for the cost of travelling to a different institution; however, the concept is that they do this for free. Probably because they know they can ask other supervisors to reciprocate and examine their own students at some point. It's part of the job. Nonetheless, i think you miss the point: external examiners would have to assess and examine my work regardless of when i submitted the thesis! Therefore, there is no cost to the university of this process being delayed by a few weeks. In fact, the contact between supervisor and potential external examiner is initiated solely by the supervisor according to his own timeframe (for example, heavy lecturing committments/holidays may delay this process by weeks) and is not a standardised, central university procedure. "You are using university employee time that is in a university period that you haven't paid for. " The time frame for this commitment is not solid. As i try to explain above, the process of asking someone to act as an external examiner for one of his students is an ongoing, year-round process consisting of informal emails, meetings at conferences etc. Frankly, i still have access to my supervisor, right up until the day of my exam (and actually beyond, to talk about corrections etc.). I am able and possibly expected to hold meetings with him in order to prepare for my exam. In his work hours. This deadline was not a solid end point to the PhD process. I can understand the university's desire to incentivise prompt writing-up, but there are no additional services that i required as a result of handing in 3 weeks late that i would not have required had i handed in on time. i can still use the library, see my supervisor, have meetings with my supervisor etc. right up until i have been examined and handed in my final thesis (probably around next March). This is why i think a £400 fine is excessive and unfair, and appears to be an instrument by which the university gains revenue.

Thank you all for your replies. I think some extra information would be helpful... The charge is a central university charge. The assessment of my thesis would have happened regardless of when i submitted. Furthermore, it is assessed by external examiners, none of whom are paid by the university (to the best of my knowledge). Therefore, the assessment of my thesis has not been affected by the extra 3 weeks. i.e. if it had been submitted 3 weeks earlier, exactly the same process would have occurred, namely it would have sat on my supervisor's desk for a month or two while he contacted suitable external examiners. The central university is not involved in this assessment process. to clarify, the charge has been imposed by the university, not my department. I agree that it is my fault that i missed my deadline. However, the costs the university has incurred as a result of this are negligible. In fact, they are essentially nil. The next step post-submission is for my supervisor to contact external examiners to arrange my exam. this is essentially a private matter and does not require the university to do anything. Therefore i think that the charge is unfair as the magnitude of it does not reflect the costs incurred as a result of my late submission. If my late submission meant that i could not attend a previously arranged exam, then i would expect there to be a significant cost associated with re-arranging the exam/booking another exam room etc. But this is not the case. I did not apply for an extension as my supervisor advised against it. However, i think this is irrelevant as the requirements for an extension are not quite specific, including death of a spouse etc. Late submission caused by employment is noted as not being acceptable as a reason for an extension. To recap, the university has incurred absolutely minimal costs as a result of this 3 week late submission. Therefore, i think that the charge is unfair as it does not reflect the cost to the university of my delayed submission. Rather it is a cost of my full enrollment as a part-time student for a full term. This does not fit the requirements of my situation. Does this reply affect the credibility of this complaint? It's hard to be impartial on this, so i really appreciate non-bias viewpoints. Thank you!

Hello all, I was wondering if anyone had an opinion on the validity/legality of my former university's policy of fining grad students heavily for late a late submission of a thesis? Here are the facts: 1. I was 3 weeks late in submitting my PhD thesis to my university (mid-October instead of end-September). Mainly due to my having been working full-time at the same time as writing the thesis. 2. The university sent me a letter telling me that i would be regarded as having enrolled as a part time student for a full term as a consequence of these 3 weeks. 3. They then invoiced me for GBP400 as the cost of the tuition fees for the relevant period (1 term). Here are my thoughts: 1. If this is a penalty charge, then doesn't the fee have to reflect the administrative costs of the penalty (similarly to the OFT-investigated bank penalty fees)? I can't imagine my 3 week late submission costing the university GBP400. 2. I have not received any service as a result of the re-enrollment. For example, i have not needed classroom space, library facilities, tuition or indeed incurred any expense to them except the cost of the letters used to invoice me. What are the opinions of others regarding this matter? Could I argue that this is a penalty charge, not a service that i have unfortunately been deemed to have required, and therefore invoke the "Unfair Terms in Consumer Contracts Regulations Act (1999)" to argue that any penalty charge must reflect the actual cost of administering it? I don't mind contributing a small charge to reflect being 3 weeks overdue, but i think being invoiced for a full term is quite a vindictive, punitive and unfriendly response. Thanks in advance!