Chicago App : watch out for the ?s

This is just a quick heads-up for those who are working on submitting the Chicago application on their extended deadline. Their online application has a wierd feature where characters such as -, ", ', !, ( etc get uploaded as question marks, '?' (??? in chicago-speak). So, if you are composing essays in Word, make sure it is saved as text, and also verify the actual version. I went back into the system after I uploaded my essays, and edited the uploaded versions to hand-correct the changes. Saw that a couple of posters on BW struggled with this, and just wanted to put out a word of warning. Needless to say, you may not want to wait until the (extended) last-minute to submit ;-)

Good luck !

Edit: Actually, Chicago requires a cut-paste from your word processing program. So the steps I followed were : cut-paste, save, then go back to the page to see how the essay was saved, then edit this version to convert all those annoying question marks back to what they were intended to be, save. Rinse and repeat.

Edit2 : Oh, the payment system. Thanks Badri for bringing this back to my notice. There is another quirk in the system that allows you to submit the application without going through the actual payment system. And, you can't come back in to fork out the dineros. So, make sure you fill out the payment form before clicking the final Submit. Then, you wait - it takes over two days for the payment to be confirmed.