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Low reported severity Regulatory Action

Student complaints ombudsman finds a zero mark reasonable for a dissertation the student said was written with help from unacknowledged AI

A case summary published in July 2025 by the Office of the Independent Adjudicator for Higher Education (OIA), the independent student complaints scheme for England and Wales, describes a student who was called to a viva over concerns about a dissertation and told the examiners there that AI had been used to help write it. The student agreed the AI material was not referenced and had not declared the AI use on the form the provider required. A panel found academic misconduct and gave a mark of zero; the provider rejected the student's appeal. The student complained to the OIA, saying they received no credit for being honest about using AI or for the time and effort invested. The OIA found the complaint Not Justified, concluding that the provider followed its procedures, gave the student a fair opportunity to respond and applied a proportionate penalty. The summary does not name the provider, give the date of the events or say which AI tool was used.

AI system
Unidentified AI writing tool
Occurred
Event date unknown
Reported
8 July 2025
Event location
Unknown
What the AI did
Relation unknown
Reported harm
Educational Harm
Whose AI use
Their own AI use
Setting
Education
Evidence
AI involvement reported · Causal attribution supported · 2 sources
5 claims: 2 documented, 3 reported. 4 open questions
People reported harmed
1 person

AI system as recorded: An AI tool the student used to help write a dissertation, according to the student's statement in the viva as summarised by the OIA; the tool is not named

What Happened

The viva. A student was asked to attend a viva because of concerns about their dissertation, according to an OIA case summary published in July 2025. During the viva the student told the examiners that they had used AI to help write the dissertation.

The finding. The student agreed that the AI material was not referenced. The provider required students to declare any AI use when submitting a dissertation and to describe how it had been used, and the student had not declared it. A panel decided that the student had committed academic misconduct and gave a mark of zero. The student appealed on the grounds of a material irregularity in the process, and the provider rejected the appeal.

The complaint. The student complained to the OIA and was disappointed to receive no credit for being honest about the AI use in the viva, or for the time and effort invested in the dissertation.

The OIA decision. The OIA found the complaint Not Justified. It said the provider had considered the student's disclosure and viva answers, draft notes and written and in-person responses, and had applied an AI policy that set out acceptable and improper uses and made failure to reference AI use academic misconduct, and it was satisfied that the student's attention had been drawn to that policy, including through a previous academic misconduct process. It concluded that the student had a fair opportunity to respond and that the penalty was proportionate and in line with the provider's procedures.

Reported harm

According to the OIA case summary, a student who said in a viva that AI had helped write their dissertation, without referencing or declaring it, received a mark of zero; the ombudsman found the decision reasonable.

How Harm Occurred

The student used an AI tool to help write a dissertation without referencing or declaring it; the provider treated the undeclared AI use as academic misconduct and gave a mark of zero, which the ombudsman found reasonable.

Outcome

Resolved

The OIA did not uphold the complaint (Not Justified), finding the provider's final decision reasonable and the penalty proportionate and in line with its procedures. The mark of zero stood.

What remains unknown

  • When the dissertation was submitted and the misconduct decision made.
  • Which provider and which AI tool were involved.
  • How much of the dissertation the AI material made up.
  • Whether the student had other consequences, such as a capped resit or an effect on the degree.

What the evidence supports

AI involvement: reported. The OIA summary says the student told the examiners that AI had been used to help write the dissertation and agreed that the AI material was not referenced; the provider found academic misconduct and gave a mark of zero for that use. The penalty is the institution's response to the AI use. No output of the AI tool toward the student is described, so no relation describing the AI system's own action is recorded. The tool is not named.

5 claims: 2 documented, 3 reported. What the statuses mean

Reported According to the OIA case summary, a student asked to attend a viva over concerns about their dissertation told the examiners that they had used AI to help write it, agreed that the AI material was not referenced, and had not declared the AI use on the form the provider required.

Causal attribution. The ombudsman's summary of the record it reviewed, including the student's own disclosure; one source; reported.

  • oiahe.org.uk(opens in new tab) supports · English
    'During the viva, the student told the examiners that they had used AI to help them write their dissertation.'; 'The student agreed that the AI material was not referenced.'; 'the student had not acknowledged their use of AI on the form.'
Reported According to the OIA, the provider's panel decided that the student had committed academic misconduct and gave a mark of zero, and the provider rejected the student's appeal.

Causal attribution. The ombudsman's summary of the provider's decisions; the provider's own records are not inspected; reported.

  • oiahe.org.uk(opens in new tab) supports · English
    'It decided that the student had committed academic misconduct and gave a mark of zero.'; 'The provider rejected the student’s appeal.'
Reported According to the OIA, the student complained to it, disappointed at receiving no credit for being honest about the AI use in the viva or for the time and effort invested in the dissertation.

Causal attribution. The ombudsman's summary of the student's complaint; reported.

  • oiahe.org.uk(opens in new tab) supports · English
    'They were disappointed that they received no credit for being honest about using AI in the viva, or for the time and effort they invested in their dissertation.'
Documented The OIA is the independent student complaints scheme for England and Wales.

Causal attribution. The body's own description; documented.

Documented The OIA found the complaint Not Justified, concluding that the provider's final decision was reasonable, that the student had a fair opportunity to respond and that the penalty was proportionate and in line with the provider's procedures; it noted that the student's attention had been drawn to the AI policy, including via a previous academic misconduct process.

Causal attribution. The ombudsman's own decision; documented.

  • oiahe.org.uk(opens in new tab) supports · English
    'We did not uphold the student’s complaint (we found it Not Justified).'; 'the penalty applied was proportionate and in line with its procedures.'; 'It was satisfied that the student’s attention had been properly drawn to this information, including via a previous academic misconduct process.'

Sources

2 sources inspected. Sources that repeat one account do not corroborate each other.

How the sources were read, and where the events happened

Read in full in English on 2026-10-23 (HTTP 200). OIA case summary in its July 2025 series on AI and academic misconduct (page metadata dc.date 2025-07-08). The OIA anonymises the student and the provider. Applies to s1.

Read in English on 2026-10-23 (HTTP 200). The OIA describes itself as the independent student complaints scheme for England and Wales; used only to identify the body, not to locate the provider. Applies to s2.

Event countries: Unknown. Affected-person countries: Unknown. Court countries: Unknown.

The OIA reviews complaints about higher-education providers in England and Wales, but the summary does not name the provider or say where it is, and the OIA is not a court; no country is recorded from the scheme's remit alone. The record's jurisdiction field gives GB as the scheme's jurisdiction.

Reviewed for publication 2026-10-23: Published as a response to AI use: the higher-education ombudsman reports that a student who disclosed unreferenced, undeclared AI help with a dissertation received a mark of zero, and it found that sanction reasonable. The student and the provider are anonymous in the source, and the event date is not given.

People described

A higher-education student whose dissertation received a mark of zero for unreferenced, undeclared AI use; not identified by the OIA

People reported harmed in this case

1 person

1 AI participant · 0 other people harmed

One student, given a mark of zero, according to the OIA case summary. The student used the AI tool, so is counted among participant users.

Counted once within this case. The same person may appear in other cases. This count does not establish AI causation.

Tags

#academic-integrity#higher-education#dissertation#zero-mark#ombudsman#consequential-response

Cite this case

Compiled per our published methodology: verification statuses, sourcing standards, and corrections process.

APA

NOPE. (2026). Student complaints ombudsman finds a zero mark reasonable for a dissertation the student said was written with help from unacknowledged AI. AI incidents. https://nope.net/incidents/2025-student-complaints-ombudsman-finds-zero-mark-reasonable-for-dissertation-with-unacknowledged-ai-use

BibTeX

@misc{2025_student_complaints_ombudsman_finds_zero_mark_reasonable_for_dissertation_with_unacknowledged_ai_use,
  title = {Student complaints ombudsman finds a zero mark reasonable for a dissertation the student said was written with help from unacknowledged AI},
  author = {NOPE},
  year = {2026},
  howpublished = {AI incidents},
  url = {https://nope.net/incidents/2025-student-complaints-ombudsman-finds-zero-mark-reasonable-for-dissertation-with-unacknowledged-ai-use}
}

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