A group of business executives who paid ?8,500 for an MBA course are still awaiting exam results and certificates from Southampton University six months after handing in their final dissertations, writes Phil Baty.

"The attitude displayed is typical of procedure-focused, responsibility-dodging bureaucrats - it could not be further from a proper business attitude, which is customer-focused, decision-making and responsibility-accepting," Christian Destree, one of the students, said in a letter to the university's vice-chancellor last week.

The next day, on March 31, his results arrived by email - a pass with "merit". But as The Times Higher went to press, he had not received his certificate and full outline of his results.

"They've made us look like fools," said Mr Destree, an independent consultant.

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"I've been looking for clients and have had to skirt round the embarrassing fact I did not have my MBA for months."

A Southampton spokeswoman declined to confirm the number of students affected, but she said that all but "a few" from a course understood to have had up to 50 students had had their results confirmed.

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She said that there had been problems with "implementing new information systems".