OMPT proctoring: what actually happens on test day

I coach the maths, but the messages I get on test mornings are rarely about maths. They are about webcams that will not initialise, ID cards left in a parent's car, and a glass door that apparently needs a bedsheet over it. So this is the briefing I give every student in our final session, checked against the current omptest.org rules. Where the rules say something surprising (phone behind you, not in another room; pencils only; no toilet break in a three-hour test) I say so plainly, because those details cost people attempts.

Who is watching, and what OMPT proctoring records

OMPT outsources supervision to ProctorU, part of Meazure Learning. A live proctor connects by voice and chat, an AI layer flags anything odd for that proctor, and ProctorU staff audit sessions. Your screen, your webcam and your microphone are recorded from the moment you connect until you close the browser, and OMPT says the recordings pass an automated fraud check and a manual one within 24 hours, before anyone grades an answer.

Guardian is ProctorU's own secure browser, a separate program you install before the appointment (the "Download Guardian" step appears the first time you click "Go to ProctorU" from your OMPT account). It locks the machine to the test and lets the proctor see your desktop. Before the start, with your permission, the proctor can move your mouse and keyboard to fix settings; after Start they can only watch. The proctor knows nothing about the maths: they cannot say whether an answer format is acceptable or what the on-screen calculator does. Content problems go to OMPT support afterwards, ideally while you are still being recorded.

System requirements: the machine, the network, the browser

Most laptops from the last five years pass ProctorU's minimums; the failures I see come from work laptops with locked-down operating systems, campus wifi, and a webcam that "worked last month".

The room and the desk: what is allowed and what gets you stopped

The room scan is where a surprising number of check-ins stall. You must be alone in a quiet, closed, well-lit room. The door has to be visible behind you in the webcam view, and any glass door or window has to be covered. Open-plan kitchens and large living rooms are explicitly discouraged. The desk is a hard, clear surface with no tablecloth, and there is one chair in the space, yours.

The phone rule confuses people because it changed from what older forum threads describe. The current instruction is that the phone must "normally remain behind you, visible and out of reach". You need it for the reflective pre-check anyway: use it (or a mirror) to show the proctor your screen and the sides of the laptop, then put it on a shelf or chair behind you where the camera can still see it. Not in another room, not in a drawer.

Breaks deserve their own paragraph, because I have had students plan a three-hour OMPT-D around a toilet stop that does not exist. The rule is flat: no breaks of any kind, toilet included, and an unapproved interruption "may lead to test termination". Go before you log in and keep the bottle small. If you sit two different tests on the same day, leave at least an hour between them.

The test-day check-in sequence, minute by minute

This is the order the omptest.org test-day page and the "Taking the OMPT test" article describe. Connecting normally takes 5 to 10 minutes and none of it counts against your test time. Reddit accounts of strict proctors put it nearer 10 to 15, and on public holidays OMPT warns that fewer proctors are on duty and the start can slip by up to an hour.

1. Fifteen minutes before your slot, open the Guardian browser and log in to your OMPT account from memory. Nothing else is open on the machine.
2. In the "Test info & access" class, click "Go to ProctorU", then "Start Session". The appointment time is read in the time zone on your ProctorU profile.
3. System check of webcam, microphone, operating system and connection speed. A failure here is the moment to fix cables, not later.
4. Automated photos: one of you, one of your ID. The name on the ID must match your OMPT profile.
5. A proctor connects by voice and chat. You will not see them; they see you and your screen.
6. Rules review, then you show the permitted items one at a time: both sides of each A4 sheet, the pencils, the eraser, the clear bottle.
7. Room and screen scan: pan the room slowly with the laptop camera, including the desk surface, under the desk and the door behind you. Then the mirror or phone check of the laptop screen and its edges. The phone goes behind you afterwards.
8. The proctor activates the test and sends you to the OMPT site, where you log in a second time.
9. Click Start. The timer begins now and only now. Time lost after this click because of a technical fault is something to note and report to OMPT support afterwards.

During the test: what the camera wants to see for 180 minutes

You stay on camera with your microphone live for the whole sitting: 180 minutes on the OMPT-D, OMPT-F and OMPT-G, 150 on the B, 120 on the A, C and E. That sounds oppressive and then, about four questions in, you forget it entirely. Every student reports the same curve: self-conscious for ten minutes, oblivious after.

What the rules ask of you in that time is short. No speaking, not even reading a question to yourself; the help centre spells out "no talking or reading out loud, even to yourself". Face, hands, paper and mouse stay in frame. Eyes stay on the screen or the paper, because repeated glances off-screen are the classic AI flag. If you think best while staring at the ceiling, practise thinking at your paper during your mocks instead. On the D and F, where you type your calculations into a note field, the paper you draft on has to stay visible, which usually means the laptop sits further back than usual. Try that layout during a free timed mock.

Smaller frictions cost nothing if you let them. One of my students had a fire alarm test in her building during question 12. She flagged it in the chat, stayed in her seat, waited it out, finished with 79%. The test is long precisely so that no single bad minute decides it.

Finishing: the scratch paper gets torn up on camera

Submitting is a procedure, and skipping any part of it makes the appointment invalid according to OMPT's own article. Go to the test overview page and click Submit at the bottom left. Tell the proctor in the chat. Then, on camera, erase any notes and tear each sheet of scratch paper into small pieces one by one. The proctor watches you log out and close Guardian. If the timer runs out and the test auto-submits, stay seated: you still owe the proctor the paper-tearing and the log-out. The certificate arrives within 8 business days (4 with fast grading); see what happens after results.

What to do if something goes wrong: five branches

The fear I hear most is the connection drop, but it is one of five failure modes I have actually seen. In every case the recording of how you behave is what protects you.

The webcam or microphone fails at check-in

Stay in the session and use the chat widget inside Guardian; ProctorU support can usually fix a permissions problem (macOS camera privacy settings are the usual culprit). If it cannot be fixed, you have not clicked Start, so the attempt is not consumed. Setup issues found before the test can be rescheduled for the administrative fee: cancel the ProctorU appointment, buy the €50 "Admin Fee" product in the OMPT store, then send support your account email, the test name and a screenshot. Allow up to two business days, and the new slot needs 72 hours notice again.

The internet drops mid-test

Keep answering. All the questions were loaded when you clicked Start, and your answers sit in the browser until the connection returns. Do not refresh the page; SOWISO's documentation says a refresh loses unsynced answers. If the connection is not restored, Guardian blurs the test: log back in to your OMPT profile and use the "Reconnect with ProctorU" button on the test overview page (never click it while still connected). Reconnecting is your responsibility, not the proctor's. Note the time lost, tell ProctorU in the chat once you are back, and after the test file a request with OMPT support with whatever proof you have. The refund policy does not cover connectivity on your side, but OMPT's admin-fee article lists retakes after internet loss as a €50 admin-fee case rather than a full new purchase.

The proctor flags you

A proctor message mid-test is usually a request: show your ID again, move the camera, stop mouthing the question. Comply at once, in the chat, without arguing. The proctor may or may not intervene; either way they report it to the OMPT Examination Board, which reviews the video before deciding. Give the Board a recording of someone who did what was asked, and keep working; the timer does not pause.

Someone walks in

A flatmate opens the door, a parent brings tea. Say nothing to them, do not get up, and type into the chat immediately: "someone entered the room, they are leaving now". The rule you risk breaking is being alone; the rule you must not break is speaking or receiving help. A door opening once, logged by you before the proctor asks, reads very differently on review from a whispered exchange.

The name on your ID does not match your OMPT account

Fix this before the appointment, not at the check-in photo. Your ID must show a Latin-alphabet version of your name. If you registered with a nickname or a transliteration that differs from your passport, send a request through the support form with a copy of the ID and ask for the profile to be corrected. Bring two IDs on the day, as OMPT recommends; without any photo ID you may not be able to take the test.

Sanctions: what the Examination Board can do

After every test the invigilator files a report on any irregularity, and the Examination Board reviews it with the video and audio before choosing one of three outcomes.

Put that next to the attempt caps and the stakes become concrete. At Maastricht University SBE you have three attempts at 75% on the A, so a disqualified first sitting hurts but is survivable. At Erasmus IBEB only the first attempt counts, so a disqualification ends the OMPT route for that application.

Extra time and accommodations on the OMPT

If dyslexia, dyscalculia or another condition would give you extra time in a school exam, OMPT will consider the same, but only in advance. You fill in the special accommodation form and attach evidence from a doctor or a qualified professional, in English or Dutch or with a sworn translation. OMPT asks for at least two weeks' notice and says processing can take up to two weeks, so file the day you buy the attempt. The accommodation does not carry over: for a second or third attempt you contact support again. Microsoft's Immersive Reader (text to speech) is always on in the practice material, but for the mock and the real test it is only switched on through the same request.

The 48-hour checklist, and the mock that rehearses the room

Your mocks should rehearse the conditions as well as the content. At least one of your final timed mocks should happen at your actual test desk, at the same time of day as your slot, with nothing on the surface but the allowed items. Students who do this report the real sitting felt like "another Tuesday mock". The maths deserves your adrenaline; the webcam does not. Put that dress-rehearsal mock into the study planner as a fixed item, and book the hour of day when your practice scores were best, not the hour that happens to be free.

1. Confirm the appointment time and time zone in your ProctorU profile.
2. Install or update Guardian on the machine you will use and run "Test Your Equipment" on the same network.
3. Plug in an ethernet cable if you can; otherwise ask housemates to keep off video calls for the test window.
4. Put your passport or ID card (and a second ID) on the desk now. Check the name matches your OMPT profile exactly.
5. Count out three blank A4 sheets, three pencils and one eraser. Sharpen the pencils now.
6. Cover glass, remove the second chair, clear the desk including the tablecloth, and check that the door is behind you in the webcam frame.
7. Find a shelf or chair behind you for the phone and check it is visible from the webcam.
8. Disable sleep and the screensaver, close every application, unplug external monitors, and memorise your OMPT login.
9. Sit one final timed mock at the test desk with exactly the allowed materials and no toilet break.

Two students, two rooms

Student one is sitting the OMPT-A for Maastricht International Business, where the bar is 75% and 70 to 74% gets an individual review. She lives in a shared flat with a glass-panelled bedroom door and a desk under the window. The fix is cheap: a bedsheet pinned over the glass, the desk turned so the door is behind her, a blind pulled down. She practised at that desk with logarithm and differentiation drills for a week and ran the equipment check on Wednesday for a Friday slot. Check-in took eleven minutes, mostly the room scan.

Student two is sitting the OMPT-D for KU Leuven Business Engineering, where 60% is required and the session is three hours. He rehearsed two full 180-minute mocks with a small clear bottle, no toilet stop, and paper placed in front of the laptop so the camera saw every line of working on integration. On the day his wifi dropped for about two minutes around question 14. He kept writing, did not refresh, reconnected through the overview button when Guardian blurred, told the proctor in chat, and filed a support ticket afterwards with a photo of the router light and the timer. His answers synced; he lost nothing but calm, and he had rehearsed the calm.

A last note on rules drift. The phone rule, the reflective pre-check and the Guardian browser are all newer than most forum threads. Read the current rules page when you book, not a Reddit post from two summers ago, and not even this post as a substitute; the binding version lives with the test provider.