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Submitting an Individual Mitigating Circumstances (IMC) claim

A guide on how to complete and submit your IMC claim

You should familiarise yourself with the information on the following pages:

How to submit your claim

  1. Complete an IMC report form
  2. If you wish, you can approach SU Advice & Support for independent advice before you submit your form
  3. Submit the form and any evidence to your Director of Studies by the deadline for submitting your IMC claim. You should try to provide your evidence with the form, but you are able to provide it later, if necessary.

Completing the IMC report form

The form has five sections:

Your details

Information about you

Details of the affected assessment

Details of your affected assessments – you should list the assessment item(s) i.e., exam, in-class test etc. that were affected.

Your reason for submitting a claim

This section is for you to explain the nature of your circumstances rather than the detail. It asks you to be specific about what has prevented you from undertaking your assessment or what has significantly impaired your assessment performance.

This section also allows the University to (anonymously) understand the general reasons why students are submitting IMC claims in order to help us improve our support where appropriate. Please make sure to read and follow the guide on what is, and is not normally considered an accepted reason for an IMC claim.

Your evidence

Evidence provides confirmation of what happened, and when. It helps to provide clarity to the panel about your circumstances and how they affected your assessment performance. Please make sure to read and follow the guide on what is, and is not normally acceptable as evidence.

We recognise that some evidence can be difficult to obtain. Therefore:

  • Your evidence does not have to be an official document or certificate, especially if the circumstances are health related and you do not need to provide multiple pieces of evidence if they all confirm the same thing
  • Your evidence may come later than your submission of an IMC claim form. If you need longer to provide evidence, you should explain this on on your claim form. Your claim form must be submitted by the deadline
  • You do not need to provide original copies of your evidence. With electronic evidence you can provide a screenshot if you need to. With physical documents you can submit a scanned copy or a digital photograph of the original. If you are not comfortable with electronic submission of your evidence, you should speak with your Director of Studies or Student Experience Officer (School of Management) for advice.
  • If your evidence was not originally produced in English, then an official translation must be provided.

Your statement

In this section, you'll be able to go into detail about your circumstances and the impact they had on your assessment (this might include not being able to submit your work). Word lengths are included as a guide to how much detail you need to go into. The information you share will help the panel to understand your circumstances and the impact.

When considering your IMC claim, it will be the severity of the impact on your assessment that is relevant, rather than the severity of the impact on you as an individual. Of particular note will be when the circumstances occurred; if they were unexpected, unplanned and/or outside of your control; and how they impacted on your assessment performance (as opposed to your ability to study).

The information you provide will be treated in accordance with the University’s Data Protection Statement for Student Registration. If you are concerned about providing evidence or about disclosing a sensitive, personal situation you may wish to speak confidentially with SU Advice & Support or Student Support.

Deadline for submitting your IMC claim

You should submit your IMC claim as soon as you can after an affected assessment/exam and by no later than the following deadlines:

  • If you are submitting an IMC claim for a single/individual assessment, you must submit your claim no later than three working days after the deadline for the affected work
  • If circumstances affect more than one of your assessments during the formal exam period, you must submit your claim for all affected assessments, no later than three working days after the end of the exam period

Further information

Please read our overview of IMCs for information on how your claim will be considered and how you will find out the outcome.

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