Hotcourses sent requests for more information on courses at a range of institutions in the UK, USA, Australia, Malaysia, Singapore and New Zealand. On average, only 62% of email enquiries received responses, and of those only 36% were answered within 24 hours.

“We know from our research with students that they are more likely to apply to universities that respond quickly and with a personalised response,” said Mike Elms, CEO of Hotcourses.

Universities in Malaysia was the worst at both response rate and customised answers

“Simply re-directing students to the university website is unlikely to encourage them to apply or engage further,” he added.

The survey showed that 33% of responses to student enquiries were customised or tailored to the student’s question, while the rest were automated.

New Zealand showed the best response rate at 80% while institutions in Singapore were the best at responding with customised answers.

Universities in Malaysia was the worst at both response rate (35%) and customised answers (5.8%).

The student enquiries were sent from over 15 country websites including China, India, Singapore, Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, Vietnam and Russia.

Gmail, Yahoo, Hotmail and Outlook were among the email accounts used to send the requests over a period of one month.

Other studies have similarly shown that response rates are important for students to assess the quality of a university.

“Students have so little data on university quality other than the rankings that they base their assessment on a range of things including response times,” confirmed Matthew Robb, Senior Principal at education consultancy firm The Parthenon Group.

This month, Hotcourses plans to extend its i-Apply managed applications service to include Arabic speaking countries from the Middle East and full Arabic online counselling services. Launched in September 2012, the company says it has managed 6,000 applications from international students on the English language version of i-Apply.

“Students have so little data on university quality that they base their assessment on a range of things including response times”

Elms said Hotcourses was also considering offering a system for universities to better manage their interaction with prospective applicants.

“We recognise that answering enquiries fully is very resource intensive, which is why we are working to extend Hotcourses i-Apply further to help universities by providing a managed response service,” noted Elms.

“This will free up international offices at universities as well ensure that students get a high quality response to encourage them to take the next step.”

The move is part of the company’s expansion efforts which might include selling to Inflexion Private Equity although an agreement, reportedly worth £35 million, has not yet been reached.