The portal I couldn't buy.
My own programme needed an exam, human marking, gated results, certificates and a way to charge for reissues. Nothing off the shelf did it without trusting the machine too much. So I built the whole flow, and the paid part is live for you to click right now.
The exam
71 questions. 90 points grade automatically, where the answer is a checkable fact. The rest is writing, and a person marks the writing. A 90-minute timer enforced by the server, so a paused browser doesn't pause the clock. One attempt per email. 70% pass mark.
AI is in there, and it's advisory only. Pre-marking runs on a model on my own machine, and the code checks twice that it stayed there: if the work would leave the building, it refuses to run at all. Its suggestions land in front of the human marker as a starting point, and candidate essays never leave the machine.
The gate
Results are hard-gated. Until a named human green-lights a specific candidate, the release route answers a per-candidate human green light and nothing emails. There's exactly one place in the code that can release a result, and it sits behind that check.
It's the same rule that runs through everything I build: nothing touches money or customers without a human saying so.
Failing usefully
71 of 71 wrong answers are auto-mapped to the lesson that teaches the point, and to the second inside it where the point is taught. The mapping runs locally against the full curriculum, and every suggested link is flagged for a human to review before a candidate sees it. Fail a question, get sent to the exact minute of the exact lesson. That's what a result is for.
Certificates with no moving parts
Certificates render entirely as inline SVG, straight from the exam data. There's no PDF library underneath, so there's no library update waiting to quietly break it.
The part you can click
Reissuing lost certificates used to be an unpaid admin interruption. Now it's a product: £10 per document through Stripe Checkout, and the flow runs itself right up to the human gate.
Apply
The form is rate-limited per visitor, and applications nobody approves expire on their own. Applications nobody approves expire on their own after three days.
Pay
Stripe Checkout. Real card, real money, receipt handled by Stripe.
Approve
A person checks the record before anything is issued. Same gate as the exam.
Deliver
A download link that can't be guessed (a 24-byte random token, for the technical reader). The link dies after thirty days.
Refund
One click, if the record doesn't check out. Taking money means being able to give it back.
- The reissue service. Live and taking money. Liveopen the reissue service
- Every number on this page. Method and date for each./claims/
What this is to you
A custom portal with payments, approvals and delivery, built and running for my own programme. If you need one of these, this is what mine looks like, and you can watch it take a payment before you've ever spoken to me.