question counter on GMAT practice test keeps resetting to 1 randomly

Question

I just started the second official GMAT practice exam, and I encountered the same bug that I saw when taking the first official practice exam. The question counter sometimes resets to 1 randomly. After the first 8 questions on the quant section the counter just reset to 1. Has anyone else had this issue? How do you prevent this from happening?

AndrewN · Answer

Hello,  vhfan78 . This is a known issue that I have seen mentioned several times in the forum. Some members have reported pausing the exam as soon as they notice the question reset, exiting out, then returning to the same exam and resuming, with success. It is a bug that GMAC™ ought to have fixed by now, but since the first two tests are free, maybe GMAC™ is prioritizing other concerns.

Try out the pause-and-return method to see if that works. You can contact GMAC™ to report the issue, but so far, I have not read anything in the forum about an official response on the matter.

Good luck.

- Andrew

vhfan78 · Answer

Ok, I'll try that. Thanks for the reply. So this is not a problem on official practice tests 3 through 6 which aren't free?

Archit3110 · Answer

As mentioned in post above , its a bug which has been there for a while now but GMAC seems to not be bothered of rectifying ...
Try reaching out to customer care at gmac..

AndrewN · Answer

I cannot confirm that,  vhfan78 , but it does make sense that GMAC™ would prioritize a paid product over a free one. At the very least, if you did run into the same problem and could not correct it using the above method, you could contact GMAC™ and request another code so that your aborted attempt did not count as one of the two attempts allowed on those practice tests. (You can reset practice tests 1 and 2 as many times as you want.)

Good luck. Please let us know whether the above method worked for you.

- Andrew

GmatKnightTutor · Answer

Consider trying a different browser to see if that helps.

ScottTargetTestPrep · Answer

Hi vhfan78,

Did you get this sorted out?

vhfan78 · Answer

No

I reached out to Customer Care and they told me to clear cookies and cache, exit browser, and try again. I tried this with Chrome and Safari and it still happened on Official Practice Test 1 after I followed their steps. I ended up just manually keeping track of the question number on my whiteboard when doing the practice test again. This bug originally caused me to study for the GRE over the GMAT for like two months (since I got a horrible score on my very first GMAT practice test since I never knew what question I was on and didn't realize it was a bug). I ended up getting a higher percentile score on the GMAT (in 90s) without any studying than I was able to get on the GRE with 2 months of studying. Very frustrating....

mooshigooshi · Answer

I faced the same issue with mock 2 and then the paid mock 3. I anyway completed the mock by clicking save for later as soon as it did a reset. I had to repeat this cycle 3-4 times in each section and ended up skipping a question each on both parts. Pretty annoying given how expensive these tests are.

Should I ask them to get me the 5th mock? Getting an additional attempt on this won't serve any purpose.

Should I ask them to get me the 5th mock? Getting an additional attempt on this won't serve any purpose.

AndrewN · Answer

Hello,  mooshigooshi . You can, of course, ask GMAC™ to rectify the issue, but I doubt you will be handed two free additional mocks. (I think you mean to say that you purchased practice tests 3 and 4, and that resetting number 3 would be useless. If so, I agree that you will likely see repeat questions, and that such a testing experience might produce skewed results.)

Was the question you skipped the last one of each section, by chance? I ask because this is another issue that has been mentioned recently. It seems as though the transition to the new interface, despite several months in which to work out bugs, has been anything but smooth.

Let us know what GMAC™ tells you, should you decide to write and complain. (I would for a faulty paid product.)

- Andrew

mooshigooshi · Answer

Hey Andrew,

Yeah, it was the last question for both sections. I remember counting/checking the number of questions I had remaining in each section and as per my understanding, the penultimate question was supposed to be the last one. Can you please tell me more about this issue so that I can check if I calculated incorrectly or if it's a bug in the platform?

Also, yeah I already wrote to them yesterday and have not heard back yet. Will keep y'all updated on the progress there.

ScottTargetTestPrep · Answer

So, you are now done with the GMAT?

AndrewN · Answer

It seems to be a bug that automatically skips the last question. It is quite annoying because a skipped question is counted as an incorrect answer, and that, of course, can affect both the section score and overall score. I doubt there is any way to check whether your score would have turned out differently, unless you happened to answer every attempted question correctly and still earned a score below a 51.

I imagine GMAC™ is getting inundated with queries related to yours. I suspect that unless people stop purchasing tests 3 through 6 as a result of the bug, the issue will be deemed low-priority and will likely persist for much longer than it should. (As long as nothing of the sort happens on the actual exam, it will probably be treated in a similar manner as a typo in the OG.)

Thank you for thinking to post again once you receive a response from GMAC™.

- Andrew

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question counter on GMAT practice test keeps resetting to 1 randomly

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