£300 debited from a refund without permission -pls advice

free

Hello all,

This is the situation. I enrolled on a course and block booked all the courses. I completed two courses and decided to leave the course. I had booked for 14 but did only two. The refund is for the remaining 12 courses only.I asked for a refund and they took £300 out and said it was cancellation fees. I had a thorough look at my terms and conditions and it does not state this. I objected to the £300 being deducted but i was informed it was going to be deducted.

I have written asking for their complaints procedure and made a written complaint. I have no idea if they are signed up to a code of practice with any standard organisation. The providers provide professional courses and i am wondering what next i can do as i told them that it was daylight robbery to take that amount and there is nothing in their terms and condtions about this amount. I also asked them to give me a costed breakdown of what the £300 covered as a cancellation fee and asked them if it was for administration because it would be extremely exorbitant if it was for this. Please note that i had not recieved any course material from them and had informed them 6months before the course ws to start.

I am yet to recieve the refund for £4495 after the £300 has been deducted.

The course providers are a well known professional school and as such wont name them.

I am still waiting for a response to my complaint as well as the refund.

Any suggestions.

maninthestreet

You entered into a contract with the school, that you now wish to break. Even thought the terms and conditions of the contract may not mention this cancellation fee, the school would have acted legally even if they had refused to refund a single penny.
You have completed 2 of the 14 courses so, at the very least, you have to pay for those - £300 sounds cheap for 2 courses, as (£4495/14) X 2 = £642. You can't expect to get something for nothing - the school has been generous to you by only deducting £300.

free

seeing as i have started to challenge the £300 cancellation fee, they have since updated their website to include the cancellation fee and called me up to point this out. I then pointed out to them that this was done recently and i could not be bound by the new terms and conditions and pointed out to them the previous terms and conditions i signed up to. In their haste they forgot to update their brochures with the new terms and conditions and i pointed this out to them. The caller kept quiet and said i could make a complaint. They then called me up again and said that the £300 was for administrative purposes but that they would look into the matter and see if they could reduce or cancel the cancellation fee.

I have contacted a solicitor an education one who advised me that from what i have said that i would have a case under contact law and should contact a contract speacialist. This is all i needed to know, did i have a chance to take them to court? Since i do i feel it would be well worth my pursuing this if they dont cancel the cancellation fees or reduce it to £15 only.

Any positive suggestions will be favoured.

Mark7799

Do your terms and conditions make ANY references to cancellation procedures? e.g. that you can cancel and get a refund of all fees or that if you cancel before a certain date you can get a refund?

timnicebutdim_2

Surely you should pay pro rata for one seventh of a service you've used??

maninthestreet

timnicebutdim wrote: »

Surely you should pay pro rata for one seventh of a service you've used??

Quite - the OP clearly states they completed 2 of the 14 courses - why should the school not be paid for these (the cost of which seem to be more then the disputed £300)?

free

The terms and conditions did not have anything for cancellation except for transfers and charged £25 if you informed them 14 days in advance before the course started for a transfer. It had a cancellation fee for international students of £200 plus study materials.However since i have challenged the cancellation fee they charged me they have now updated their terms and conditions to state that a fee of £100 will be charged as cancellation fees and a deduction for books and study materials will be made for classroom studies.

free

I actually did pay for the two courses that i completed. The refund is for the remaining 12courses that i didnt do.