The virtual visit will take place via Microsoft Teams. 

The structure of your virtual visit will be as follows. The moderator will:

• Brief you at the start of the visit
• Carry out their moderation separately, offline 
• Need a subject assessor to be available as required to resolve any queries during the day 
• Schedule a provisional feedback session at the end of the session. 

The structure of the in-centre face-to-face visit will be as follows:

• Moderator arrives at the centre as agreed
• Centre makes requested sample of candidate work available
• Moderator carries out the moderation in an agreed location within the centre
• Moderator will need a subject assessor available to resolve any queries during the day
• A provisional feedback session will take place in centre

Face-to-face moderation visit day arrangements 

Please make sure you discuss the arrangements for the moderation visit with your moderator before your visit. 

This must include how you will provide or present evidence on the day. Although you will have already uploaded evidence to Submit for Assessment, the moderator must be able to access the evidence within your centre during the visit. This might be as hard copy printouts of portfolio evidence or digital output on your own centre systems (e.g. within a certain software package).

If you will find it challenging to provide suitable facilities, IT access or moderation evidence, consider choosing a virtual visit. 

You need to make sure you have a quiet base room available for the visiting moderator in which all work to be sampled can be accessed, including facilities for accessing moderation systems via the internet, moderating any electronic portfolios/evidence or replaying any audio and/or video recordings. 

You also need to check: 

• All other centre-assessed and internally moderated work submitted for moderation can be made available if needed. 
• All centre assessment records are available – either individual unit recording sheets (URS) for each candidate, and/or a breakdown of candidate marks for each unit by assessment criteria within a central tracker or spreadsheet. 
• Copies of set assignments and any supporting material are available if applicable. For example, where an assignment allows a centre to provide or adapt the product or data given. 
• All candidate authentication forms have been completed and signed. 

Centre staff will not normally be required until the visiting moderator is ready to discuss the provisional outcomes, although centres should ensure that the visiting moderator has sufficient support to deal with any queries during the visit.

Access to candidates is not required during the external moderation process.

Visiting moderator identification

Due to internal safeguarding policies we appreciate centres may need to see identification from visiting moderators before they are allowed access to the site. We do not issue visiting moderators with any form of identification, and we have advised moderators they should bring the following with them to any visit:

• A valid form of photo identification (e.g. passport, driver’s licence)
• A copy of their invitation to moderate
• A valid DBS certificate if they have one (we do not require visiting moderators to hold a valid DBS certificate in order to fulfil the role).

We also suggest visiting moderators arrange to meet their named contact on arrival at the centre, as they will have the moderator’s details and can verify these with their identification.

If your safeguarding policy requires some form of supervision for visitors whilst on site, this requirement should be discussed with the moderator before the visit so there is no impact on the moderation process.

We have advised visiting moderators of what identification they should take with them on visits; however, if you have any concerns then please contact our Customer Support Centre.

If the moderator agrees with your centre’s assessment decisions, they will confirm this verbally during the visit. In addition to this provisional verbal feedback, a written feedback report will be sent to you after your visit following completion of our internal quality assurance checks.

If there are any issues identified with the marking of any criteria, this will be highlighted during your feedback. 

If there are several issues identified, the moderator will ask you to revisit your marking of these criteria before final results are issued for this moderation – but not to improve student work. Updated marks for the unit(s) in question will need to be submitted once you have done this. Some additional moderator checks will be carried out and your moderator will support you with this process.

Candidate work must be retained by the centre until after the certificates have been issued or any reviews of results processed. We will not consider any enquiries if the work is not retained.