This is a detailed guide on what to do if your WAEC result is withheld or outstanding.

Good news to all those who took part in the 2020 West African Examination Council (WAEC).

The 2020 WAEC result is out.

If you’ve yet to check yours, you can follow our detailed guide on how to check the 2020 WAEC result, and check yours.



The 2020 WAEC (2020 West Africa Senior School Certificate Examination ) result was released on the 2nd day of November 2020.

Sadly, not everyone that took part in the examination has seen their result, as 215,149 WAEC results were withheld.

We have explained the meaning of Witheld WAEC result, and WAEC Outstanding result. Check it out here: Meaning Of Held, Witheld and Outstanding On WAEC Result.

If you registered for the 2019/2020 West African Examination Council WAEC (2020 WASSCE), and you are one of those whose WAEC result is withheld or Outstanding, and you are feeling frightened, and not knowing what to do, worry no more, as this guide will help.

This guide titled What To Do If Your WAEC Result Is Withheld or Outstanding In 2020, is a detailed guide which seeks to provide help to students whose WAEC result is withheld or Outstanding, and also provide all the information and trending updates about WAEC withheld results.

In this guide, we will attempt to answer some of the frequently asked questions regarding WAEC held result 2019/2020 like:

  • when will WAEC release the withheld results?
  • when will WAEC release withheld results 2019
  • Will WAEC ever release the 2020 held results?
  • What are the latest updates on WAEC held results?

This article will also provide the latest news about WAEC withheld results, and much more.

All that is required from you is to just follow us carefully, and in no sooner time, you will have all the information you ever need to know about WAEC 2019/2020 withheld results.

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Are you ready? Good!!! But before we proceed, let me give you a quick background of WAEC, for the sake of those who don’t know it.

A Quick Background Of WAEC

The West African Examination Council, WAEC was established in 1952.



It is an educational board that is in charge of managing some strategic examinations in the West African states of Nigeria, Ghana, Liberia, Gambia, and Sierra Leone.

The WAEC certificate is a highly respectable certificate both within and outside the shores of Africa, and as such, the demand for it is usually high.

This examination council is not only saddled with the responsibility of conducting the West African Senior School Certificate Examination (WASSC), but also the junior school certificate examination, which is used to gain admission into senior secondary schools within the anglophone West African states.

It should be mentioned here that West Africa Senior School Certificate Examination (WASSCE) is usually conducted two times a year, the first one being on May-June while the second one popularly known as WAEC GCE starts by November/December.

Also, within the countries that it exists for, no person can be admitted into universities without a WAEC result or its equivalent.

This goes to show you how important the WAEC result is.

Why Did WAEC Withhold My Result?

It’s no longer news that in each year, just like this year, WAEC normally withholds the result of many students.

Hence, a lot of students have been left in the dark, wondering why WAEC chose to withhold their results.

WAEC withholds results if they feel that a particular WAEC examination center or candidate was compromised, on the grounds of examination malpractice.

Consequently, an investigation will be carried out by WAEC to ascertain if the center or candidate was involved in exam malpractice or not.

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At the end of the investigation, if that center or candidate is not found guilty, their results will be released immediately.

However, if they find such exam center or candidate guilty, then the result for that center or candidate will be canceled.

This means that the candidate or candidates involved will have to retake the WAEC exam the next year.

However, there are rumors that WAEC withholds results when they discover that students generally did very well in the exam, and by way of limiting this, choose to withhold some of those results.

Whether that is true or not, is not the reason for this article.

When will WAEC Release My Withheld Result?

Some affected students all over have been asking us this same question, seeking to know when WAEC will release their withheld result.

Well, there is no straight forward answer to this.

Just like I said earlier, Once your WAEC result is withheld, the board usually try to review your specific case, and make a decision base on that.

Hence, there can’t be any specific answer to this, as the process may be between a few weeks or a couple of months.

What To Do If Your WAEC Result Is Withheld

All you should do at this point is to patiently wait for the council to decide on your case. After the decision, they can either release your result or cancel it.

Generally, WAEC does release withheld results before the release of JAMB admission lists.



This is done so that students will not on account of that miss their admission into universities.

However, while you wait for them to make their decision on your case, you may not really know whether they have released your result or not.

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Hence, you might want to keep checking the result twice every month, using the online WAEC result checker.

While checking it, make sure to be mindful of your scratch card, because you can only use it 5 times before it expires.

What To Do If Your WAEC Result Is Outstanding

If your WAEC result says “outstanding,” then it implies your result is not released yet, due to some errors made by the candidate.

You shouldn’t worry much if your result is outstanding, as the result will definitely be released immediately after the errors are rectified.

Also, there is literally nothing you can do if your WAEC result is displaying outstanding.

You just have to keep checking the result, so you know when it is released.

However, Instead of sitting at home and getting yourself worried, you can go to your School and complain to them about the status of your WAEC result.

Hopefully, they can prefer some help, that will fasten the rectification of the problem and the release of your result.

Penalties For WAEC Examination Malpractice

If you have ever imagined what the penalties of engaging in examination malpractice in WAEC could be, below are some of the penalties as reviewed by WAEC.

  • The result of the candidates in view may be canceled completely, once WAEC has established a case of malpractice against them.
  • If the malpractice case was reported on specific subjects, then WAEC can cancel the subjects in view.
  • Depending on the severity of the reported case of malpractice, a candidate can suffer further losses like a suspension from registering WAEC for a specific number of years.

That’s all on what to do if your WAEC result is Withheld or Outstanding.

I hope this guide helps?