Why Does a Prospective Applicant Choose a Different University?
Analysis of how the speed of recruitment communication relates to enrollment decisions. Daskalos Consulting, 2025–2026
A lost admissions inquiry represents, according to our own analysis, 350,000–800,000+ HUF in lost annual tuition revenue for an institution. A lost international inquiry represents 3–5× that amount, because international tuition is typically that much higher. While the international student population grows 18% year over year according to our own research, 62.2% of respondents identified precisely the admissions period, including the summer score-threshold period, as the period of heaviest load. Below, we show what happens to a prospective applicant who doesn't get a timely, native-language response, and what a well-designed recruitment assistant would do differently.
Growing pressure, precisely where the most is at stake
Admissions and international recruitment sit at the intersection of two mutually reinforcing trends. According to our own research (n=37, 2025–2026), 62.2% of respondents identified the admissions period as the period of heaviest load, while the international student population grows 18% year over year and international administrative capacity cannot keep pace with this growth.
This means that precisely during the period when a prospective applicant is deciding where to apply, the institution's administrative capacity is under the greatest strain. And this bottleneck grows worse year over year, not better.
What happens when a prospective applicant doesn't get a fast response?
Our survey also showed that student- and admissions-type inquiries arrive through the same channels, with the same level of congestion, as existing students' questions.
| Channel | Share of respondents marking it as most overloaded |
|---|---|
| 89.2% | |
| In-person service | 75.7% |
| Phone | 56.8% |
Time to first response exceeds 6 hours for 37.8% of respondents, and in 64.9% of cases, a single response doesn't even close the question. For an existing student, this causes frustration. For a prospective applicant, who has no commitment to the institution yet, this simply means a lost applicant: while waiting for a response, they are looking at another university's website.
What builds trust in an applicant weighing a decision?
In our research, we measured what higher education professionals fear when adopting an AI-based customer service solution.
| Concern | Share |
|---|---|
| Accuracy of responses | 83.8% |
| Data protection / GDPR | 59.5% |
| Integration into daily work | 27.0% |
From a prospective applicant's perspective, the reverse is equally true. An inaccurate or unverifiable answer, for example a wrong deadline or document list, is worse than no answer at all, because it can undermine trust in the entire institution.
What does a well-designed recruitment assistant solve?
Emily's retention and recruitment role is built precisely around these points. Native-language responses, 24/7: international applicants receive an instant answer in their own language, without having to wait due to time zone differences or outside working hours. Instant answers to admissions questions, deadlines, and document lists, with source citations, so the applicant is not forced to search through scattered website content. Collecting the applicant's data and handing it off to the recruitment team, so the applicant is not lost in an unanswered email but enters the recruitment process. Automatic follow-up email sequence, which maintains contact even after the first interaction, so the applicant is not left alone during the decision-making process.
These four elements are, in our view, not optional extras but a baseline requirement for a system to genuinely be called a recruitment assistant. Without native-language responses, an international applicant simply cannot understand what they're applying for. Without source citations, the answer cannot be verified by either the applicant or the institution. Without data collection and follow-up, the applicant falls back into the scattered, unmanaged correspondence they started from after the first response. What is built without these is, at best, a question-and-answer interface, not a recruitment assistant.
What does this mean for the institution?
If the admissions and international recruitment periods truly carry the heaviest load, and if a slow response truly leads to a lost applicant, as our analysis shows, then the speed of recruitment communication is not merely a matter of customer experience. It is directly linked to enrollment numbers, and through them, to institutional revenue.
If you would like to assess where your institution stands in this regard, how much time currently elapses before an admissions question is answered, and how much potential there is for speeding this up, feel free to reach out to us.
About the research: Daskalos Consulting's national survey, based on responses from staff at 37 Hungarian higher education institutions, conducted over 2025–2026, over a period of nearly eight months. The survey covered both student- and admissions/applicant-type inquiries. The revenue impact linked to enrollment is the result of our own internal analysis, not directly measured survey data. The full methodology is available upon request.