Assessing an application

Once every earlier step is done, Assess opens the assessment itself: the application on one side and the Assessment Form on the other.

Labels that name Application and Assessment use your organisation's own term if you've renamed it.

The confidentiality agreement

Some organisations ask you to agree to a confidentiality agreement before you see an application. When one is owed, it opens over the page before anything of the application is shown.

Read the terms.
Tick I agree to these terms. Proceed stays unavailable until you do.
Select Proceed.

If the organisation changes the terms while you are reading them, you see The terms changed while you were reading them. Read the terms below and tick the box again. Closing the agreement takes you back to your Dashboard with nothing recorded.

The assessment page

The page shows the Applicant, the Assessment Round and the Due Date. On a wide screen the Application Form sits on the left and the Assessment Form on the right. On a smaller screen they stack, with Jump to links to move between them.

View Application Form shows or hides the application.
Open the Application page opens the application on a page of its own, with the Applicant information and any Video submission. When the round's eligibility screener is shown to assessors, an Eligibility tab shows the screener answers and the staff verdict. Select Back to the Assessment to return.
Declare a conflict appears while the assessment is Assessing on a round that asks for a conflict of interest declaration. Use it if you find a conflict part-way through. See Conflict of interest.

If the organisation shows duplicate flags to assessors, an application that may duplicate another in the round shows Possible duplicate beside its status. Backed tells you nothing about the other application; ask the organisation if you need to know more.

Answer the Assessment Form

Your answers save automatically as you type. The Total Score panel updates with each answer; Scores by field shows each scored field's Score, Weight and Weighted score. A form with no scored fields says This Assessment Form has no scored fields.

Where your organisation has described what each answer means, a scored field in Scores by field also lists its Scale: each option with its score and a short description of the level, lowest first. Any Guidance for the question is shown there too. Use them to choose the option that fits the application best.

AI aids

When the organisation turns them on for a round, an AI aids panel appears under Total Score. The aids read only what you can see of the application, and they help you read it: they never fill in, suggest or change a score or a comment. Check what they tell you against the application.

AI summary gives you a short summary of the application, labelled AI-generated — check it against the Application.
Find evidence lists up to three quotes for a scored field, each taken word for word from an answer, with a link to that answer. Use it beside the field in Scores by field, or in the panel to cover every scored field. If no quote can be matched exactly, you see No quotes matched the answers exactly.
Check consistency is available once you have saved your assessment. It flags where your comment and your mark may not agree, or where a mark is well away from your usual mark. It's marked Advisory – changes nothing, and the flags aren't kept.
Check eligibility and budget compares the answers with the round's published criteria and budget rules, and checks that the figures add up.
Possible duplicates lists other applications assigned to you in the round that read closely alike, each linked so you can open it. No AI model makes this list.

Each result offers Save and Discard, which record what you did with it. The text itself isn't stored, so even a saved result goes when you leave the page. Discard removes it straight away.

If an aid doesn't finish, select Try again; your assessment hasn't changed. There's a daily limit, and past it you see You have reached today’s limit for AI aids. Try again tomorrow. Possible duplicates doesn't count towards it.

Private notes

Private Notes is a space for your own notes on the application. Only you can see them, and they save as you type. This appears only when it is turned on for your organisation.

In a round that uses blind review, Backed withholds what would identify the applicant. Depending on how the organisation set up the round:

the applicant's name and details show as Anonymised for blind review;
each answer the organisation marked as identifying is empty, with Anonymised for blind review beside its label;
when the application's title comes from one of those answers, the application is named by its reference number instead: in the page heading, in My Assessments and in the browser tab;
uploaded files are renamed, for example Attachment 1.pdf, and download under that name, or are left out;
a file shows only its current version, as Version 1 of 1, with no History and no name of who uploaded it.

On the Conflict of Interest page you declare against the application's reference number. In an assessment PDF you export, the applicant's name prints as Anonymised for blind review. This appears only when the round uses it.

Reading uploaded files

Under each uploaded file, View opens it full screen without downloading it: a PDF or an image shows in the viewer, and other files say Preview not available with Download. When a file has been replaced, Version n of m and History show its earlier versions, who uploaded each and when.

References

If the grant shares references with assessors, the application page shows a References section under the application: each completed reference, who gave it, when, and their answers. Under blind review the answers stay and the referee shows as Anonymised for blind review. References are never in your exports unless the grant shares them.

Exports

Export Application downloads the application as a PDF, or as a PDF with its uploaded files. Export Assessment downloads a PDF of your assessment: your answers and its current Total Score. Select Export Assessment as PDF in its dialog.

If the assessment is taken away

If an Administrator removes the assessment, or a conflict of interest is recorded while you have it open, you are taken back to your Dashboard with That Assessment is no longer available to you, so your last change was not saved.