Microsoft’s second shot offer, is not compatible with bulk voucher purchases.
Here at the Bit-Wizards National Corporate Office Complex we purchase our
certification vouchers in bulk to obtain a better rate. The nature of our
consulting and development business requires that we spend considerable time and
money on training to demonstrate our expertise. Recently, I read about Microsoft’s 2nd Shot Certification Exam Offer. The steps are
fairly straight forward, you log-in to the Microsoft 2nd Shot Offer site, click
a link to request a voucher number, and you are to use this number on the
Prometric site when you schedule your exam.
However, there is one problem. When I logged in to the Prometric
site, pick my exam, location, and get to the payment page, the page has a
single link near the top that states, “Do you have a Promotion Code or Voucher?”
{Sure I do I have two} So I click that link, select voucher, enter my 2nd Chance
Voucher, and enter. I am returned back to the payment page with only the fact
that no errors were displayed to confirm that my number was accepted. Back at
the payment page the, “Do you have a Promotion Code or Voucher”, question is
still present. So I go through the process again and enter my payment voucher
code, which once again is accepted without error. Now at this point, I’ve
entered both voucher numbers and can clearly see that the second voucher was
accepted because the balance is now $0.00, but no visual cues to whether the 2nd
Chance voucher was also applied or accepted.
So just to be safe, I email Prometric’s CS team and they replied with the
following:
Dear Kevin Grohoske,
Thank you for contacting Prometric.
Please be informed that you will
be able to use either of the two vouchers; but not both at the same time for
your exam registration.
Also be informed you may use only one voucher (for
complete/partial payment) per exam registration. In case you wish to avail the
second shot offer, you may use the second shot voucher provided by Microsoft for
the exam registration. You will have to pay the balance amount using a credit
card while registering online or you may contact the contact center/testing site
regarding the same.
We hope this information is helpful. Please feel free to contact us if
further assistance is needed.
Being the guarded optimist that I am, I expected this answer…but… is this the
correct answer. Their web site clearly accepted both vouchers without erroring.
If only one voucher is permissible, then why does the link continue to be
displayed, would I pass the MS Exam if I practiced similar web site interface
designs {No}.
So consider this a warning to the test takers and an open call to Thomson
Prometric to fix their web site. It does not appear to have been updated since
roughly 2004 and with Microsoft recently announcing you as their only
certification exam proxy, you may want to spend a few bones to update the web
site.
