Why do professional exams keep going wrong?

The author of this article has investigated four major errors in high-stakes medical exams over the past 14 years. Three of these concerned UK medical royal colleges and one the UK Foundation Programme Office. In all these cases, candidates received incorrect exam results, with some applicants even receiving an incorrect pass or fail grade. Although all involved organizations fully cooperated and expressed regret, the errors had serious personal and professional consequences for those affected. These exam errors shared common features and were mostly the result of human error. They occurred under conditions where mistakes are more likely. One of the main vulnerabilities is the transfer of information between different software systems.