ApplyInsights: How LOA Turnaround Time Impacts Students and Schools

In order for international students to begin their education journey abroad, they need to receive a Letter of Acceptance (LOA) from their desired school. Until this document is issued, students are unable to select their courses, apply for scholarships, or submit their student visa application. Therefore, the process of waiting for an LOA can be highly stressful and can greatly impact the decisions that students make going forward.

In this edition of ApplyInsights, I am going to examine the correlation between LOA wait time and successful student enrolment. 

How Do Students Respond to Shorter Wait Times?

A college or university application is, in many ways, similar to other transactional activities. 

Consider this scenario: You are looking to purchase a house. You want to get approved for a mortgage as quickly as possible so that you can put in an offer and secure the property. In this situation, chances are you’re going to favor the broker who gives you a pre-approval rather than waiting for all options to come in. 

With international students, the need is especially intensified, because it is their education and future in question. Therefore, they would presumably be more responsive to the faster LOAs. 

Having processed hundreds of thousands of applications, ApplyBoard now has the data to test this assumption.

Based on our data, students are most likely to pay their tuition deposits or confirm their seats with schools who issue LOAs within one week of application submission. In fact, schools have a 17% lower chance of receiving a student’s tuition deposits if they take more than four weeks to send out an LOA.

It is no surprise that students are more inclined to commit to institutions that offer speedy LOAs. Consequently, there is also a correlation between fast LOAs and final student enrolment as well.

Connection Between When an LOA Is Issued and Enrolment Rates 

Our data suggest that the ideal amount of time that schools should take to issue an LOA is seven days or less, for the highest probability of successful student enrolment. While each individual case is different, our data indicates that on average, the less time it takes for students to receive an LOA, the more willing they will be to enrol at a school. 

Specifically, compared to the ideal wait time, which is one week to issue an LOA, students are 4% less likely to commit to schools that take 1-2 weeks to issue an LOA, 10% less likely to enrol at a school that takes 2-4 weeks to issue an LOA, and 19% less likely to go with schools that take more than 30 days to issue an LOA. 

Given the direct impact of issuing LOAs quicker on student enrolment, schools will want to consider improving their student conversion from priority countries as an effort to diversify their student body and enrich campus life. ApplyBoard assists both parties – the schools and the students – in this process by helping students identify desired institutions, submitting complete applications, and performing proper screening.

Key Takeaways for Schools

While schools reap significant benefits from faster LOA turnarounds, students are the ones who experience the most positive impact. Visa applications usually take a while to go through, especially now with COVID-19 affecting every government agency and causing delays in processing times. Therefore, it’s only reasonable for students to expect their LOA in a timely manner in order to proceed to the next steps of their education journey. 

With this in mind, ApplyBoard is committed to connecting schools with students from all over the world and working with our partners to improve the application process and enhance the student experience.