Statutory requirements

The competition and markets authority (CMA), formerly known as the Office of Fair Trading (OFT), is a government body designed to promote competition for the benefit of consumers. Following a consumer protection review of the higher education sector the CMA published advice regarding the application of consumer protection law within a university context in March 2015.

Read UK higher education providers - advice on consumer protection law

The CMA's advice outlines the responsibilities of the institution during a student's application, offer and enrolment and the information which a student should be provided with during each stage. 

In particular the CMA outlines the institutions responsibilities to provide material information about a programme to a potential applicant, this includes;

• The programme title and award
• Entry criteria
• Core modules and an indication of likely elective modules
• Details of the composition of the programme including the number of contact hours a student can expect and the likely workload factoring self-study
• Details of the general level of experience of staff involved in delivering different aspects of the programme
• The methods of assessment 
• The length of the programme
• Details of any accrediting bodies
• Any terms, conditions or regulations of the university which a student may find surprising or which may prevent a student from completing their programme
• Tuition fees (including expected increases year-on-year)
• Any additional costs including field trips, equipment or consumables/bench fees

Material information provided to students becomes a binding term of the contract which the institution establishes with the student by making them an offer. Any subsequent changes to this information require explicit student consent.

The CMA have also published a guide to consumer rights for students.

If you have any queries regarding the CMA advice please contact the quality assurance and enhancement team.

Unistats is a set of core statistics and information about the institution and its undergraduate programmes which is published annually by the OfS on the Discover Uni website. 

The basic information includes:

• National student survey (NSS) results
• Findings from the Graduate Outcomes survey  
• Information about accrediting bodies

Discover Uni allows prospective students and other interested parties to compare information about different programmes at different institutions via the information provided in Unistats.

The College submits an annual report to the OfS with Unistats data for each undergraduate programme during the summer term each year. Please contact the Student External Returns team in Registry for more details of the data collection process.

The wider information set (WIS) is a broad set of information which HEFCE recommends as the minimum amount of information which institutions should make publically available to other interested parties. 

The information includes:

• The institution mission statement
• A corporate or strategic plan related to HE provision including a statement of quality assurance policies and processes
• A learning and teaching strategy
• Details of collaborative partnerships including the nature of the partnership and the responsibilities of each partner with respect to quality assurance and standards
• An employability statement
• Prospectus
• Programme guides and module outlines for each programme and module
• Tuition fees for individual programmes
• Information on the availability of bursaries and other financial support including eligibility criteria
• Details of links with employers including where employers have input into a module or programme
• Procedures and outcomes for programme approval, monitoring and review
• procedures for external examiners including external examiner reports
• Results of internal student surveys (available internal only)
• Procedures and policies for student complaints, appeals and representations
• outcomes of appeals and complaints (available internal only)

If you have any queries regarding the WIS please contact the quality assurance and enhancement team.