Pearson VUE - my mistake

Take this as a cautionary tale..

I was in the process of creating an account on Pearson VUE's website. I used the name I go by as I do for every other account I have ever created. When I booked my CCENT exam, I read the disclaimer that your name on your account MUST MATCH your ID you provide. I registered as Brad, but on my ID my name is Bradley. I tried to change my name on the account, but you cannot. You have to contact support. I tried the chat engine and was told to call support. Their support line is outsourced. I had a horrible time understanding the person on the line. I had to submit a photocopy of my ID, open an issue with their support staff etc. I tried following up via the chat engine again today. I figured, hey I'm not submitting a ticket, I just want to know the status of my previously submitted ticket. Again, it was evident that the person I was communicating with did not speak English very well.

Lesson learned, just use the name as it appears on your ID. Hopefully you will never need to call their support line.

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stryder144

Similar problem with PV, very frustrating. I accidentally created two CompTIA accounts. Once I figured out that I had two accounts, I contacted CompTIA directly and they resolved the issue in about 24hrs. Great service. Unfortunately, I had taken a test, through PV, using the second CompTIA account number I created. Once I had both CompTIA accounts merged, they sent a message to PV, thus putting the number they associate with CompTIA into a pending status. Since I was curious, I decided to find out what pending meant. My mistake!

I contacted PV, via that stupid chat box. The rep on the other end decided that what I needed to do was to establish a second PV account! Well! Let me tell you, that was not good. They decided to merge the first account with the second one. That doesn't seem to be too bad, I suppose, except they never gave me a password. In the process, they disabled the original account (the one I didn't have any issues with). No password for new account, first account no longer active, and a need to take several exams...fun! Ugh! It took those fools over a month to sort themselves out. Absolutely pathetic. Several hours of phone calls and "chats". Too much wasted time. Unfortunately, both my job and my education depend on my having access to PV testing centers...since they are the only ones that we can take the majority of our certification exams through.

At any rate, I hope your journey with them is a lot smoother and gets resolved a heck of a lot quicker, too!

scaredoftests

I am not a fan of Pearson.

beads

scaredoftests wrote: »

I am not a fan of Pearson.

I don't think Pearson is a fan of Pearson. Had my share of over aggressive Pearson folks before.

-b/eads

shortygirl

scaredoftests wrote: »

I am not a fan of Pearson.

Me neither. And I've found that chat support for these places is worthless. It took me a month to get my Microsoft "second shot" exam problem sorted out. And the only thing wrong was that the online proctored exams don't pass along the second shot in the system like the regularly proctored exams do, so I had to obtain a voucher from Microsoft. Took a phone call to make that happen. Pearson was no help at all when I contacted them about it.

Always just call.

bradl3yC

Hopefully my issue will be resolved by Monday/Tuesday of next week. Apparently the first person that answered the phone gave me the wrong email address to send my documents.

gespenstern

Old story, same happened to me (names are Leo and Leonid). Pearson support said that I should have paid attention to a warning when registering. I've checked and they are right, there is a warning nobody pays attention to because the web page is too overloaded with various crap not critical to registration process.

Requirement to send photo id is simply outrageous. Who they think they are? I mean, it's not required for registering, but it's required to change registred name, WTF?

So solution is simpler here, just abandon your newly registered account and create another one, this time with your full name. It worked for me.

gespenstern

So you are sending your personal information by e-mail, which is insecure, in many cases is sent unencrypted between e-mail servers and in cases when it is it doesn't have a robust way to ensure that it's encrypted and not eavesdropped on. In addition to this you've probably sent your PII to a third party because of an error in e-mail address. And that's because you were asked to do that and this step was positioned as necessary.

stryder144

beads wrote: »

I don't think Pearson is a fan of Pearson. Had my share of over aggressive Pearson folks before.

-b/eads

I know one of their former developers...I wouldn't say he was a fan of them, either.

bradl3yC

gespenstern wrote: »

Old story, same happened to me (names are Leo and Leonid). Pearson support said that I should have paid attention to a warning when registering. I've checked and they are right, there is a warning nobody pays attention to because the web page is too overloaded with various crap not critical to registration process.

Requirement to send photo id is simply outrageous. Who they think they are? I mean, it's not required for registering, but it's required to change registred name, WTF?

So solution is simpler here, just abandon your newly registered account and create another one, this time with your full name. It worked for me.

I would but there are already exams scheduled and they were paid for by a company purchase card. I am choosing the lesser of 2 evils....hopefully.

ratbuddy

stryder144 wrote: »

I know one of their former developers...I wouldn't say he was a fan of them, either.

Tell him he's a butthead. I did a password reset on a Pearson Education site and they just emailed my password back in cleartext.

Mooseboost

My only issue was the actual proctor. I took my CCENT and ICND2 at separate locations. I will not go back to the first. The printout told me to be there 15 minutes early. I got there at exactly that, she was very rude and pretty much told me to F off until the exam time. I came back 5 minutes before to fill out my paperwork and she made me sit there until my exact exam time. I was not a happy camper. Totally opposite experience at the 2nd location. Guy let me back early.

Chinook

Much the same has happened to me and my ID was denied. I am a part time Canadian military reservist & have a restricted weapons license. I wanted to use the gun license as ID but was denied. So I can fire a howitzer and purchase a handgun with this ID but I can't take a Windows Server exam. I had also just put in my middle initial instead of my middle name. This was a #fail

I find the whole exam experience pretty bad to be honest. There are few places to take the exams & very often the rooms are small, hot & the chairs suck. How is this conducive to taking a long, advanced exam?

gespenstern

Chinook wrote: »

I am a part time Canadian military reservist & have a restricted weapons license. I wanted to use the gun license ...

lol

I thought at first that you will proceed telling us that you pulled your handgun and was allowed to proceed with exam with exam proctor at gunpoint despite the fact that you used your first name in its short form which is, as it turns out, an inexcusable thing at Prometric

Just kidding.

quickman007

I've had nothing but great experiences with them. I got to the testing center an hour early for the ICND1 and they let me go right in and take it. Am I thinking of a different Pearson?

bradl3yC

quickman007 wrote: »

I've had nothing but great experiences with them. I got to the testing center an hour early for the ICND1 and they let me go right in and take it. Am I thinking of a different Pearson?

My issue isnt with the test center. It is with their horrible customer service department.

Chinook

gespenstern wrote: »

lol

I thought at first that you will proceed telling us that you pulled your handgun and was allowed to proceed with exam with exam proctor at gunpoint despite the fact that you used your first name in its short form which is, as it turns out, an inexcusable thing at Prometric

Just kidding.

, no, up here we are not permitted to carry a handgun. There are no carry permits except for the odd few (police excluded) and that numbers in the hundreds. But I like your thinking. It would make a good episode for a movie.

When I think of this, it wasn't at Pearson Vue though, it was at the other guys.

shoebhuss

Sorry for bringing up a new thread.
Same happened with me today. I wrote my short name because my name is huge. And the exam admin didn't let me write the exam and raised an ticket. Pearson people cancelled my exam and told me that i had to make a whole new payment just because of the name. Exam fee is my One months salary and plus the amount of time i spend preparing for the exam is pretty upsetting.
Any idea guys if i can do anything about this and department i can contact to get this fixed?

scaredoftests

Go to their website. Also, ask where that exam is for the supervisor, I am sure they have contact with Pearson.That is outrageous!!!

mbarrett

gespenstern wrote: »

So solution is simpler here, just abandon your newly registered account and create another one, this time with your full name. It worked for me.

+1

I dealt with their support line once to refund an exam, and it sounded from the accent that they were in India (this was a couple years ago.)
Luckily, they had a complete process for what I was trying to do.
Hopefully, more US companies are switching to the Philippines, who are a lot easier to understand.

stryder144

One thing to remember is that the testing centers are not owned by Pearson, which can be either a blessing or a curse. If the testing center employee isn't lazy, they can help resolve a lot of issues by calling their support phone number. They have an inside track, so to speak, with Pearson and can usually help correct problems a lot easier and faster than a customer/tester contacting them.

shoebhuss

So, I raised a complaint regarding this on "learningnetwork.cisco.com" Their moderator was nice enough to guide me through the process of updating the name. One have to signup on "ciscocert.secure.force.com" and raise a case for their issue and ask them to update their name and as well attach a copy of some sort of identification like Driving Licence. After that they'll just update the name. LOL, Being such a huge company the site should be more transparent and User friendly. Like why can't i just update the Name throught pearson it self.

And yeah its not upto cisco's part if i can get a refund or reschedule for the exam.

And Pearson Support sucks big time. I spoke to 3 diff customer representatives regarding this and all they said i have to make a "Fresh Payment". And finally one guy game me their email "PVAPcustomerservice@pearson.com" I will try to contact them today. Hopefully they reschedule my exam.