<p>What's the difference between an official and an unofficial high school transcript? Other than the possible cost difference (which there does not seem to be, in my case), why would you want an unofficial transcript?</p>
<p>They give us two options - official sealed or unofficial. Since the cost is the same, why would someone get an unofficial transcript? Is it the same as getting an official sealed transcript and then opening it?</p>
<p>Unofficial is that you get a copy and send it yourself; official is one sent by school in sealed envelope or provided to you to send and it is already in a sealed envelope that says if you open it before sending it will no longer be considered an official transcript. The difference is simply reliability. Many colleges require the official one because that assures it has not been tampered with.</p>
<p>There are reasons to get an unoffical transcript -- for your own info, to send to schools that do not require official ones; for many scholarship applications where they only need a copy of the transcript.</p>
<p>Whoa, your school makes you pay for transcripts???</p>
<p>Yes. Why does the school have an option to get an unofficial transcript? I don't see any case where an unofficial transcript would be used instead of an official one, ignoring the process of getting one and assuming I don't need to look at it.</p>
<p>For programs that say "unofficial transcripts are acceptable," is it always OK to send an official one instead?</p>