My Complaint against this company is based on the tactics they use to entice/entrap persons into entering their online campus. I was looking for a career changed and decided that I wanted to become a lawyer. I saw an ad. For their college on the website and gave them my information. A few days later I got a call from one of their representative. They questioned me on my college education, current job, future goals and why I wanted to return to college. I was concerned about the tuition fees based on what I had seen on the internet, however after sending them some more education information on myself and taking their entrance questionaire, they told me that my college tuition for the time that it wold take for me to get my bachelor's degree would be $15,862.30. They even made me sign a Cash payment installment Note which would make the payments more affordable for me as I would have to monthly payments of $1,258.62 per month from April 15 to April 15.
Suffice it to say they convinced me it was a good idea to pursue my goal to become an attorney via their online education. I therefore got a second mortgage on my home in the amount of $15,000.00 to be able to afford the monthly payments. Please keep in mind that i had to sign and fax this cash payment installment note back to them to be entered into my classes. I later was able to get a student grant in the amount of $500.00 which further decreased my monthly payments to $1,213.18 per month for the remaining 13 months. The classes were fast paced; intensed and exciting. I loved taking my classes and my lecturers and did well in all of my classes passing 6 classes with "A". It was October 15 that I went to make my normal payment that I noticed that my tuition had increased from $1,213.18 to over $3,000.00. This was more than double and I just simply thought it was an error on their part, therefore I sent them an email to correct the error.
Instead of correcting the error I received a call from the financial department requesting that I sign and return a new cash payment installment note that now had the new payment of over $3000.00 per month. I told the person on the other line I could not sign that as that was not our original agreement. He tried to explain to me that someone should have told me that the first cash agreement was for the first year and that on the second year the tuition would be increased. He went on to state that they had had this problem before and therefore were not doing anymore cash payment installment plans. I told him that I had sign a binding agreement and had I known the installments would have increased I would have never began the classes. He went on to ask if my company would not reimburse me for the tuition or if I could not get a FASA Student Loan. I became very angry at this point because I explained to him that if someone had made an error in sending me the Cash payment installment note for the monthly payments then it was there problem. I had budgeted for the payment in the agreement and I did not see the need to get another loan because I had already gotten a second mortgage on my home to be able to afford the payment.
He stated that if I did not pay the new amount then I would have to withdraw from the classes. I told him to have my adviser contact me because he did not seem to understand that they had made me sign a Cash payment installment agreement that as far as I was concern was binding on them and on me with the amounts that was stated in the note. My adviser called me 2 days later and while she empathize with my fruastration she was only an employee of the company and only reiterated that there was an error on their part and that if I could not afford the new payment that I should withdraw from the classed not to incur anymore charges. She told me that as long as I signed into the website that I would be incurring charges.
As my budget could not afford this more than 100% increase, I told her to withdraw me from the classes. She said that someone would be calling to confirm the withdrawal. I received that call and she too advised me not to enter their website. I therefore began to look for another online college to continue my education (Pheonix Online) they told me that they would send for my credits. Shortly after I spoke witht he representative from Pheonix Online, I got a call from a representative from AIU stating that they wanted to know when I intended to pay the balance that I owed. I asked him what balance he was talking about as I made my payments on time as per my agreement and was never late. Please keep in mind that at this point I had already paid them $9,133.85. The Cash payment had stated that the total cost to me would be $15,862.30. I still had 6 more classes to take. He told me that I owed them $7,278.15 as AIU charged by the semister and had only given me the cash payment plan to make it more affordable for me. He also told me that now that I had withdrawn from classes they were demanding payments in full.
I TRIED EXPLAINING TO HIM THAT THE WITHDRAWAL WAS A DIRECT RESULT OF THEM CHANGING THE CASH PAYMENT AGREEMENT THAT FORCED ME TO WITHDRAW!!! I told him that nobody at AIU seemed to be able to listen to what I am saying at which point he told me that it was I who was not listening, they simply wanted to know when they would get paid. I told him that I would have to speak to an attorney about what had occurred as I do not feel I owe them anything. I feel they entrapped me to enter their online college with the cash payment plan knowing that they would increase the fees and that if I wanted the degree I would have to pay them. They therefore enduced the withdrawa that has resulted in this outstanding amount. This was all just a big scam and can be seen as fraud on their part. I just recently found out that I am not the only person to whom this has happened.
Ernestine
Freeport, Arizona
Bahamas
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