Log-in problems

Every message the log-in and sign-up screens can show, what it means, and what to do about it.

"This address is not on the beta list yet."

Sign-up is in a private beta, so this one is new and it is the message people meet most often. In full:

This address is not on the beta list yet. Request beta access, or log in instead if you already have an account.

It appears on the sign-up screen (/signup) and the host sign-up screen (/host/signup), in amber, when you choose the button. Nothing is sent: no code email goes out, and you stay on the screen.

It never appears on the log-in screen. Logging in is unchanged by the beta.

Two things this message is not:

It is not about your account. Everybody the beta turns away gets these exact words — somebody who has never used FilmScorecard and somebody who has had an account for months alike. It cannot tell you which of the two you are, and it is not trying to. FilmScorecard never reveals which addresses are registered, and this sentence is no exception.
It is not a typo check. The address you typed may be perfectly valid and simply not approved.

What to do, in order:

Try logging in instead, at /login, with the same address. If you have an account — because a festival invited you, because your beta request was approved, or because you made one earlier — a code arrives and you are in. You were on the wrong screen, not blocked. Sending in a submission does not give you an account, so a filmmaker who never made one gets no code.
Check which address was approved. Your account is created on one exact address. Register on a work address and try the sign-up screen on a personal one and this is the message you get. The approval email names the address to use, and your account is already waiting on it, so log in with that address rather than signing up.
Register, if neither of those is it. Request beta access in the message is a link to the registration form for the card you chose: Festival Host opens the Festivals page's form, Judge the Judges page's and Creator the Creators page's. On the host sign-up screen it always opens the Festivals page's form. See Requesting beta access.

If you were invited by a festival, you should never see this. An invitation link takes you to a version of the sign-up screen that does not consult the beta list at all. If you are meeting the refusal while holding an invitation, you have probably arrived at sign-up some other way — go back to the email and use its link.

If you came from a festival's public page, you should not see it either. Its Apply to judge button leads, through the log-in screen's Create an account, to a judge sign-up the beta does not apply to. Meeting the refusal there means that door had closed by the time you pressed Create account: the judge call closed, the festival switched its page off, or its organization was suspended. Go back to the festival's page — if it no longer has a Judging tab, the call is over. See Applying to judge from the page.

Nor if you came from Save to your account. That button, on your own submission page or scorecard, leads through the log-in screen's Create an account to a filmmaker sign-up the beta does not apply to. Meeting the refusal there means one of two things: you finished in a different browser from the one where you typed the access code, or a new code was sent after you typed yours. Go back to the page, type the newest code, press Save to your account again, and finish in that same browser. See A submission's access code goes around it too.

"You need to agree to the Terms of Use and Privacy Policy to continue."

The other sign-up refusal, and the simpler one. Both sign-up screens, in every version, carry a box above the button reading I agree to the Terms of Use and Privacy Policy, and this sentence appears under it, in amber, when you press the button with the box unticked.

Nothing is sent and nothing is checked: no code email, no Check your email screen, and the beta list has not been consulted yet, so ticking the box may still lead you to the refusal above. Everything you typed is still on the screen. Tick the box and press the button again.

The two names in the box are links, and each opens in a new tab, so reading the documents does not cost you the form. See The Terms of Use and the Privacy Policy.

It never appears on the log-in screen or the code screen, because neither creates an account. The registration forms on the Festivals, Judges and Creators pages have the same box and the same sentence, in red rather than amber; see Requesting beta access.

Why the code screen appears even when the address is wrong

This is the one that catches people out on the log-in screen.

When you type an address on the log-in screen and choose Log in, you always land on the Check your email screen — whether or not that address has a FilmScorecard account. FilmScorecard deliberately never reveals which addresses are registered, so an unknown address looks exactly like a known one at that step.

The consequence: if the address has no account, no email arrives, and the attempt only fails when you enter a code. You get "That code didn't work or has expired. Check it or resend." That message is telling you the truth — the code is not valid — but the underlying reason may simply be that there was never an account on that address.

What to do, in order:

Check the address on the screen. The Check your email screen prints the exact address the code went to. Typos are the most common cause.
Try the other address. Use the address your account was made on: the one your invitation arrived at, the one you registered for the beta with, or the one you typed when you created it. Work and personal addresses are the usual mix-up. A festival entering your film does not make an account, so the address on your submission only works here if you made an account on it yourself.
If you registered for the private beta, use the address you registered. Approval creates your account on that exact address and on no other, and the approval email names it. You do not need to have received that email first: once your request has been approved, asking for a code on the address makes the account on the spot if it does not exist yet, and the approval email arrives alongside the code. If you have not registered at all, that is the step to do first: Requesting beta access.

Choose Change email on the code screen to go back and try a different address.

The email has not arrived

Give it a minute. The Resend code link unlocks after the countdown reaches zero.
Check your spam or junk folder for the subject Your login code.
Check the address printed on the screen, then use Change email if it is wrong.
If several code emails have arrived, use the newest one.
If nothing arrives at all and you are sure of the address, read Why the code screen appears even when the address is wrong above.
After Keep it on a scorecard, the code went to the address the festival has on your submission, shown partly hidden, and there is no Change email. If you no longer read that address, use Save to your account instead, which lets you use an address of your own — see A submission's access code goes around it too.

Waiting on the email that says your beta account is ready? That one is not a login code. A person approves each request by hand, and until they have, nothing you do hurries it. Once they have, the message goes out within a day on its own — or the moment you first ask for a login code on that address, whichever comes first. So there is no need to wait for it: try the log-in screen. If you have been approved, the code and the "account is ready" email arrive together; if you have not, the Check your email screen appears and nothing follows, exactly as for any unknown address. Nothing is sent when a request is declined. When the address you registered already had an account, a judge or creator approval sends nothing, because that account already works — and a festival host approval sends "You're approved to set up your festival" instead. See Requesting beta access.

Told you were approved, tried to log in, and still nothing after a minute? Wait for the countdown and choose Resend code once. In the rare case that your account was being created on our side at the very moment you asked, the first try comes back empty and the second one works. If that brings nothing either, use the Contact link at the foot of the screen and say that you were approved: the approval may need to be redone on our side, and that is quick.

Message by message

Message	What it means	What to do
This address is not on the beta list yet. Request beta access, or log in instead if you already have an account.	The address you tried to sign up with has no approved beta request. It says nothing about whether that address has an account.	See the section above. Nothing was sent and nothing changed.
You need to agree to the Terms of Use and Privacy Policy to continue.	The agreement box on the sign-up screen is not ticked.	Tick it and press the button again. Nothing was sent. See the section above.
That code didn't work or has expired. Check it or resend.	The six digits were not accepted. The code may be mistyped, more than 10 minutes old, from an older email, incomplete, or the address may have no account at all. After Keep it, it also means the festival has sent a new access code since you typed yours on the scorecard.	Retype the code from the newest email, making sure all six boxes are filled. If the code is more than 10 minutes old, wait for the countdown and choose Resend code. If it still fails, check the address — see the section on the code screen above. After Keep it, go back to the scorecard, type its newest access code and press Keep it again.
Too many codes requested. Wait a minute, then use Resend code.	Codes can only be sent to an address once a minute, and that limit was reached.	Stop resubmitting. Wait for the countdown on the code screen to reach zero, then use Resend code once. The code you already received still works until it expires.
We could not send that code. Check your connection and try again.	The request to send a code did not go through.	Check your internet connection and choose Log in again. If it keeps happening, it is on our side — use the Contact link at the foot of the screen.
Check the highlighted field and try again.	Something in the form was empty or not valid when it reached us.	Look at the fields marked in amber, correct them, and submit again.
We could not save that. Try again.	Your role choice on the One question left screen did not save.	Choose your role again and select Finish and continue. If you are sent back to the log-in screen instead, you were logged out — log in and you will be asked again.
Enter your email address. / Enter a valid email address.	The email field is empty, or the address is not a complete address.	Type the full address, including the part after the `@`.
Enter your first name. / Enter your last name.	A required name field on the sign-up form is empty.	Both are required. The beta registration forms ask for the same two names and show the same two messages when one is empty.
That first name is too long. / That last name is too long.	A name field is over 80 characters.	Shorten it. You can use the name you are usually credited under.
Pick one to finish. / Nothing is selected yet. Pick one to finish.	No role has been chosen yet on the One question left screen.	Select Judge, Festival Host or Creator. The Finish and continue button stays greyed out until you do.
Google sign-in didn't complete. Try again.	A Google sign-in was started and did not finish.	You should not meet this during the beta — Google sign-in is not offered on any screen at the moment. Log in with an emailed code instead.

All of these appear in amber with an exclamation mark. Amber, not red, on purpose: every one of them is recoverable.

The beta registration forms on the Festivals, Judges and Creators pages have messages of their own, in red, and they are listed in Requesting beta access.

There is no Continue with Google button

Google sign-in is switched off for the private beta. The log-in screen, both sign-up screens and your account's security settings offer the emailed code and nothing else. It comes back when the beta ends.

If you used to sign in with Google, nothing has been taken away from you. Your Google connection is untouched — you simply cannot use it or see it while the beta is on. Log in with a code sent to the same address and you land in the same account, with everything in it.

The code screen sent me back to the log-in screen

The Check your email screen only works right after you have asked for a code. If you open it from a bookmark, from a browser tab that has been sitting open for a long time, or after a very long gap, FilmScorecard sends you back to the log-in screen.

Nothing is wrong. Enter your address and choose Log in to request a fresh code.

Resend code did not seem to do anything

The countdown restarts the moment you choose it, which replaces the link with the waiting line — that is the confirmation that it worked. The new code takes a few seconds to arrive. Use the newest email.

Resend does everything Log in does, including making a just-approved beta account that did not exist when you first pressed Log in — see Asking for a new code.

Resend after a refusal takes you back to the log-in screen instead. That is correct rather than broken: a refused sign-up never sent a code, so there is nothing to resend.

I keep being sent to a different page than I expected

Already logged in? Opening the log-in or sign-up screens sends you straight to your own page. Use Sign out in the header first if you meant to switch accounts.
Logged out? Opening a signed-in page sends you to the log-in screen.
Landed on the Set up your festival form? That is the correct first screen for a new host account, including one created by a beta approval. Your organization and your festival are made together on it — see Setting up your festival.
Landed on "Your account isn't approved to create an organization yet."? That is the setup screen for an account whose address has not been approved as a festival host — approved as a judge or filmmaker instead, or not yet decided. Request host access on it asks for that approval. See If your account is not approved yet.
Approved as a host, but logging in lands on your judging home or your projects? An account first made as a judge or a filmmaker keeps going there. Open /host/festival yourself, or press Set up your festival in the approval email once you are signed in.
Landed on questions about what you review? That is the correct first screen for a new judge account. See Setting up your judge profile.
Landed on a festival's application form after those questions? That is where you were going: finishing the judge profile takes you back to the judge-portal page you first asked for — the open call whose Apply to judge you pressed, for example — rather than to your judging home.
Landed on Your projects, or on Add your first project? That is the correct first screen for a filmmaker account. See Your projects.
Landed on "We set up Title from your entry"? That is the first screen for an account with no project yet when a festival submission sent from its address is waiting, including after Keep it or Save to your account. Nothing is saved until you press Open Title. See Your first project and Saving a submission to your account.
Back on the scorecard or submission page you started from? That is where Keep it and Save to your account return you once your account has a project: the page is now yours, and asks for no access code.

Still stuck

Use the Contact link at the foot of any log-in or sign-up screen. It opens the contact form — see Contacting us. (Older screens had a Trouble logging in link here that opened an email; Contact has replaced it.)

Choose Something else as the topic unless one of the others fits, and tell us the email address you were trying, which screen you were on (log in, sign up, or host sign up), and the exact message you saw. That is usually enough to sort it in one reply, which arrives by email at the address you give on the form.