WSET Policies & Procedures
& Booking Conditions
The Wine & Spirit Education Trust is a charity registered in England and Wales at 39-45 Bermondsey Street London SE1 3XF, United Kingdom, with charity number 313766 and company number 964179 (WSET).
Delivery of WSET courses are subject to regulation by the UK Government’s education regulator, OfQual. As an Approved Program Provider (APP), we are required to comply with WSET Award’s policies to ensure the integrity of the WSET Qualifications.
- Complaints and appeals
Although we always strive for high standards, if we fall short of your expectation in our delivery of WSET courses you may complain to WSET@bernard-massard.lu setting out the details of your complaint. We will acknowledge your e-mail within 4 working days, informing you of either: (i) our answer to your complaint; or (ii) what we are doing to investigate your complaint further and a timeline for our response.
If you are not happy with our response you may appeal our response by writing to WSET@bernard-massard.lu with the subject heading “complaints appeal” and your complaint will then be reviewed by a manager at the Bernard-Massard Wine Academy who shall respond within 4 working days. Should our second response still not resolve your complaint you may email WSET direct at qa@wsetglobal.com.
- Conflicts of interest
We are required to identify, monitor and manage all conflicts of interest which may have an adverse effect on the qualifications we offer. Conflicts of interest include, for example, the coaching of candidate by any individual involved in the grading of exams or the authoring exam questions. Where we become aware of any conflict of interest, such as our own staff members taking the exams with us, we report these to WSET and create mitigating procedures to ensure the integrity of our exams. If you are aware of anything which may jeopardize the integrity of the qualifications please email WSET@bernard-massard.lu and we will inform WSET.
- Data Protection
WSET requires certain personal details to create a unique student number for you or validate enrollment with an existing student number. We therefore ask for your name, birthday and e-mail address in the course registration process. This will be transferred to WSET for the purposes of exam registration, grading your exams and determining any reasonable adjustments for additional learning needs. WSET may also contact you by email to see if you are satisfied with how we delivered this course. WSET will handle your data in accordance with WSET’s Data Protection Policy[1].
To sit the exam, you are required to show us a valid government-issued ID so we can verify your identity as required by WSET.
WSET requires us to retain details of the course including your personal details for at least three years after the date of the course. WSET also retains your data so they can assist with replacement certificates (if you lose your certificate) and validating future exam enrollments by you. This, together with our privacy policy[2] relating to use of the Bernard-massard.lu website constitute our Data Protection Policy.
We are committed to protecting your privacy. If there are any questions regarding this topic, please contact us via email at WSET@bernard-massard.lu with “Data Protection” in the e-mail subject.
- Diversity and equality
No one will be discriminated on race, gender, sexual preference, religion or otherwise. A student, however, must be at least 16 (the minimum age for drinking alcohol in Luxembourg). There is no maximum age, however, due to the layout of our 100-year old building, students should be fit enough to walk up a short staircase to use the bathrooms.
To sit the exam, you are required to show us a valid government-issued ID so we can verify your identity as required by WSET.
- Reasonable adjustments for special educational needs
WSET may authorize reasonable adjustments to course materials or exam conditions if they deem this necessary to ensure the equal accessibility of their qualifications.
Students with special educational needs are asked to express their needs to us on the course registration form. We will then prepare a Reasonable Adjustment Application that we send to WSET Awards asking for appropriate adjustments for your exam and/or learning materials. WSET Awards require supporting evidence of any special educational needs – you will need to provide us with this information. We must submit this application to WSET 4 weeks in advance of the exam date so please get in touch with as soon as possible so we have sufficient time to accommodate your needs. If there isn’t sufficient time before the exam you want to take, we will discuss future exam dates with you.
We will also do our best to adapt the learning environment at Bernard-Massard to special needs that are notified to us, within the confines of the 100-year-old building (for example, steps are required to access the toilets and we cannot change that).
No unfair advantage
Reasonable adjustments must not give unfair advantage over other candidates. Their purpose is to make the qualification equally accessible to everyone.
WSET’s Decision
Ultimately, WSET makes the final decision regarding reasonable adjustments. Any reasonable adjustment approved will vary according to individual circumstances and will be agreed in each case between the APP’s Exams Officer and the WSET Exams Manager. We cannot offer any reasonable adjustments to you until this has been agreed with WSET.
- Special consideration
Special consideration is an action taken after an assessment to allow candidates who have been disadvantaged by temporary illness, injury, indisposition or adverse circumstances at the time of the assessment to demonstrate attainment.
Special consideration will not give unfair advantage over candidates for whom special consideration is not being applied or alter the assessment demands of the qualification as detailed in the applicable Specification.
A candidate may be eligible for special consideration if:
- Performance in an assessment is affected by circumstances beyond the control of the candidate. This may include recent personal illness, accident, bereavement or examination room conditions (such as excessive noise from roadworks outside);
- Alternative assessment arrangements which were agreed in advance of the assessment proved inappropriate or inadequate; and/or
- The application of special consideration would not mislead the user of the certificate as to the candidate’s attainment.
If there are circumstances that affect all candidates, we will submit a report within 7 working days to WSET requesting special consideration for the whole group. However, if an individual student wishes to make a request, then they have to apply directly to us via WSET@bernard-massard.lu, so we can forward this request to WSET within the 7-day time limit.
- Malpractice and maladministration
We are obligated to comply with WSET’s rules and regulations. If you think we are in breach of WSET’s rules please submit a complaint as described in [1] above. Students must also act with integrity by not cheating on exams, not being disruptive during exams, submitting false or inaccurate information to gain a qualification, or taking such other actions that bring WSET Awards into disrepute.
Non-compliance with WSET Policies and Procedures generally falls into one of two categories:
- Maladministration, where non-compliance is accidental rather than intentional; and
- Malpractice where non-compliance is intentional or the result of negligence.
Whether a situation is maladministration or malpractice will be determined by WSET Awards following an investigation. We are responsible for notifying WSET immediately of any non-compliance issues.
When a student is found guilty of malpractice, WSET may impose sanctions. These can range from written warnings to complete disqualifications from WSET exams including the use of WSET logos and postnominals.
- Cancellations and Refunds
Cancellations of confirmed places are accepted up to 10 working days prior to the start of the course. An administration fee of €25 plus the full cost of any study materials supplied will be deducted and the remainder of the course fee refunded to the payee.
Transfers of a confirmed booking either to another course or applicant can be made up to 11 working days before the course start date on payment of a €25 admin fee plus the cost of any additional study materials (if applicable). Alternative courses must start within one calendar year of the course originally booked and all transfers are subject to availability.
For Level 1 only, transfers requests received between 10 to 3 business days before the class date can be accommodated for a fee of €65. Last-minute changes (within 3 business days of the course) are not possible as we will have incurred fees with WSET for your place and cannot register another student in your place. No refund of the course fees will be made if the cancellation request is received within 10 working days of the course date.
For Level 2: If a confirmed course booking is cancelled by the student during the 10 business days prior to the start of the course, or at any time after the start of the course, no refund or transfer of the course fees will be made. We will have incurred fees with WSET for your course registration.
We may need to change a course date if enrolments do not reach the required minimum number for us to run the course. If you are unable to attend the rescheduled course date or a course within 12 months of the initial course booking, we will issue you a refund in full minus the cost of any study materials already sent to you. We will communicate any date changes and cancellations at least 10 working days prior to the planned start date of the course.
- Booking Conditions for WSET Courses
Course bookings may be made on this website with payment by credit/debit card and completion of the course registration form. If you would like to pay by bank transfer, please contact WSET@bernard-massard.lu for registration and payment details. No materials will be dispatched until course fees are paid.
We may need to change the date of a course if enrolments do not reach the required minimum number for us to run the course. If you are unable to attend the rescheduled course date, or a course within 12 months of the initial course booking, we will issue you a full refund minus the cost of any study materials already sent to you. We will communicate any date changes and cancellations at least 10 working days prior to the start date of the course.
- Exam Regulations
The price of the first examination sitting is included in your course fees. WSET does not authorize any candidate to attend an exam without having attended the course. If you fail the exam, you can take the exam a second time upon payment of a registration fee. Please contact WSET@bernard-massard.lu for details of applicable fees and future examination dates.
At the start of the examination, all candidates must show the invigilator photographic ID as proof of identity. This is a closed-book exam. Candidates must follow WSET’s examination conduct including no cheating during the exam. Failure to adhere to WSET’s exam conduct requirements could render your exam invalid.
- Allergies/intolerances
Please inform us of any food allergies and intolerances on your registration form as some of our courses/events include food. We will do our best to accommodate however we do not accept any liability for allergic reactions that occur during or after our events. We do not prepare food on-site so we can only pass on the ingredient information from our caterers and therefore we do not accept any liability for allergic reactions.