If you wish to defer an offer of a place you DO NOT ACCEPT your offer. Instead, you must email the Admissions Office of the appropriate college immediately. You must give your name as it appears on your CAO application, quote your CAO application number and the course code of the offer you wish to defer, and set out the reason(s) for your deferral request. Applicants must mark “DEFERRED ENTRY” clearly in the subject line of the email.

You should also check the website of the relevant college to see if they have a deferral policy available online that you can refer to. The email must arrive in the Admissions Office of the institution at least two days before the ‘Reply Date’ shown on the Offer Notice.

The college will then communicate their decision to you directly.  If the deferral is not granted you may then accept the offer for the current year providing you accept the offer by the ‘Reply Date’.
You must send all communications about deferrals to the appropriate Admissions Office and NOT to CAO.

To defer a college place, you must contact the admissions office in the relevant college to seek their approval.

If you have completed your first year you will have used up your free fees as the government only pay a student once for each year of their undergraduate course. If you do first year again in another course you will not get the free fees for this new first year and you could end up having to pay in excess of €7,000, depending on the course.

In the deferral procedure, you can defer the course you have been offered and the following year apply for that one course through the CAO. If you apply for more than that one course in the following year, then you lose the deferred place and are in open competition again for all courses including the one that was deferred.  

There are many different reasons why a student might defer a place with the knowledge that their place is secure for them the following year.

• To try out a related course at plc level to see if it suits you
• To save money for college
• To Travel
• To attend to some medical needs
• To pursue and interests in the arts or sports
• You might not be ready to go into intensive study straight away
• To enter a position in the workplace that doesn’t need a degree
• To do an Apprenticeship
• To Volunteer for the year

Yes you can.

Refer to page 32 on the CAO handbook. Link here.

So far, the Department has allowed students to attend college in the intervening year before taking up their deferred course, without the student being liable for full fees the following year.

This situation is outside the control of colleges and there is no guarantee that the situation won’t change at some point in the future.

YES. Students will be offered their first choice in Round Two, if the points come down.

If a student wants to defer a place they should contact the admissions office of the college that offered a place and request permission to postpone until next year. They must outline their reason for seeking a deferral and the college will then contact CAO on behalf of the student.

If a student is not offered their first choice and wish to pursue their second choice (which they previously deferred), they must reapply through CAO next year, listing just that one course in their application. If they list other courses other than the deferred place, they are then back in open competition with next year's applicants.