PROSPECTIVE university students have been unable to accept offers from their chosen universities before a deadline because the Ucas computer system has crashed.
The Cheltenham-based university admissions body saw its IT go down on Tuesday which has meant applicants have been unable to check the progress of applications or, crucially, to respond to offers.
The technology woes came in the same week as the deadline for students to decide where they wanted to go.
The deadline has now been extended indefinitely while the problems are fixed.
Ucas has rejected claims the crash and the amount of time it is taking to get the site back up and running are down to a lack of staff.
A Ucas spokesman said the organisation had "the right people in place" to fix the "technical issues". He said: "We know that students will be concerned about not being able to log in and we apologise for the inconvenience caused.
"There was a deadline on Thursday for some students to decide which offers they would like to accept and this has now been extended.
"The new deadline will be confirmed once IT systems are restored and we will make sure that there is enough time for students to make informed decisions before completing their replies.
"We are aiming to announce the new deadline next week. We are currently completing assurance checks to ensure we are able to return to a full live service on Monday morning.
"Students are being kept up to date through text messages, social media and our website.
"Universities and colleges are also receiving regular updates.
"Most students who applied by the main January 15 deadline have already replied to their offers and are not affected by these issues."
The crash follows fears expressed in April this year over IT jobs at the company.
Staff said they were worried for their jobs after plans were announced to outsource Ucas' IT department.
Meanwhile, 44 people were made redundant from the organisation in December 2012.
One Cheltenham mother whose daughter is currently going through the Ucas process said: "My daughter is supposed to be deciding her first and second university choices this week. But Ucas' system has been down for two days and they've now had to extend the deadline.
"With A-level results coming out in August it's a bit of a critical time. I think it's potentially a crisis. I have friends who work at Ucas and they think it's down to staffing issues. They've made people redundant recently."