Downloading question papers on the day of an exam

Who can download question papers?

Only a Centre Administrator can download question papers from Centre Services.

Assessment materials will be available to download 90 minutes before the exam’s published starting time. We recommend that the main Centre Administrator is the school Exams Officer, or a trusted member of staff who will be available during the whole exam series.

The Centre Administrator, or Exam Officer must have set up an account on Centre Services before the exams are due to start. This will enable any login issues or questions to be resolved in good time so that you are prepared for the start of exams. You can download question papers using the following steps:

log in to Centre Services with multi-factor authentication (MFA) 
select ‘Exams’ 
select ‘Day of exam material’ 
click on ‘View day of exam resources’ 
select the question paper or resource you need to download 
a pop-up will appear that says ‘send me a code’ 
- make sure you have pop-ups enabled 
- select a reason for the download 
an email will be sent to your Centre Services email address with the code, and the main Centre Services administrator will also be notified of this action by email (this will come from [email protected] – please add this email address to your safe sender’s list) 
enter the code into Centre Services to access all the paper(s) you need – You only need to enter the download code once during the session to see all the papers available.
the paper will appear in your ‘downloads’ folder, ready to use. Download folders work differently on each computer, some appear in the top right-hand corner of the
browsers, some download directly into the ‘download’ folder. If you are not sure where the files are saved, please speak to the IT Technicians in your centre.

When you request a question paper, an automated notification will be sent by email to any other Centre Services administrators at your school to tell them about this download request.

Important: If you get an email to let you know a question paper has been requested, and your school did not request it, please report this as soon as possible by calling us on +44 161 696 5995. 

Please remember that if you are moving an exam because of a clash, you will need to download the question paper during the timetabled session for that paper, as it will not be available on Centre Services before or after. If you are unable to do this, please contact our Exams Officer Support Team who will be able to help you. 

If you do not already have a nominated second Centre Services Administrator, we recommend that you set one up. To do this, the Head of Centre needs to email the request to [email protected] using the following guidance:

The subject line should be ‘Change of admin’, and please include in the email:

your centre number
whether you would like to add or change the main administrator
the name and email of the new/additional main administrator – please give the specific individual’s school email address, not a generic school email address (e.g. [email protected])
the name and email of the previous main administrator – please also confirm whether their account should be removed
that your new/additional main administrator has given their consent to manage other centre user accounts

This email must be sent from the Head of Centre’s email address. We cannot accept:

Emails from Personal Assistants, Exams Officers or any other members of staff
Emails from a generic school email address (e.g. [email protected])
Letters of verification in response to security checks

If you have problems downloading the question paper:

Please telephone us on +44 (0)161 696 5995 to inform us, and we will need your Head of Centre to verify your request. It is therefore crucial that all Heads of Centres know about this additional security measure, so they are aware they may be called upon 90 minutes before an exam’s start time.

If a Head of Centre is unable to verify the request, we may not be able to share the question paper. We appreciate this may be frustrating when there is a genuine mistake with the security protocol and a Head of Centre is not available. We ask for your cooperation and understanding that our priority is ensuring the integrity of exams, which is the fairest thing to do in protecting the interests of all students.

Colour printing and quality checking

As with hard copy question papers, the integrity and security of electronic question papers must always be maintained when downloading, printing and collating them. Here’s some advice and guidance to aid you with this:

You’ll need to set up a colour printer in your secure area to print your question papers, and only trained colleagues can download and handle them.
Please check whether the content of the paper contains colour images and check the resolutions on your printer. To make sure the papers are printed to the correct standard, papers must be printed at 600dpi, in colour and on A4 or A3 80gsm paper.
Please do not photocopy any question papers.

Once the papers are printed, please:

Check carefully that you have printed every page of the question papers.
Compare the printed papers with the electronic PDF version to ensure all the content has been printed correctly, paying particular attention to shading, colour, graphs, diagrams and images to check they have printed as expected.
Check for correct sizing, shading, colour, graphs, diagrams, and images.
Ensure correct collation.
Pages must be in the correct order and match the PDF exactly.
The question paper file must be deleted and then deleted from ‘Deleted items’.
The question paper is not to be used by anyone other than the student(s) taking the exam
Question papers must be sealed within a non-transparent envelope marked clearly with the exam details on the outside of the envelope. The envelope must be stored securely and kept ready for transfer to the examination room at the appropriate time.
Avoid stapling each corner of the script. This slows down the logging process, as staples must be manually removed.
If you need to secure pages, use a single staple in the top-left corner or a paper clip where appropriate.