I was an "Admissions Advisor" at AIU Online in 2007. While working there, we were notified of a new employee education program that they were starting. We were told that as long as we work at AIU Online, that we could also attend school there for free. So I decided to give it a try as I have never done online schooling for me. So I took my first month of classes (each class lasts a month). After the month I decided that the online learning environment was not for me (even though the teachers were great). I decided to talk to my admissions advisor and stop attending classes. A few months after I cancelled my classes, I received another job offer and resigned from working at AIU Online.
Today: I decided to take a look at my credit scores and noticed that they had dropped. As I started Looking over the report I noticed that there was a new collection on there from AIU Online for around $4000.00.
I thought that this had to be a mistake (maybe they forgot that I was an employee there). So I immediately called them and was directed to the Accounts office. I ended up talking to a "supervisor" who told me that the classes weren't free for employees and that it was a reimbursement program. I was outraged because this was never explained to us at that time. It started off as a free program when I worked there, and I found out that they had changed it to a reimbursement program after I left.
Anyways, he told me that I did not cancel my classes properly and that I why I was charged $4000.00.
From working as an admissions advisor, this place is a rip off. They paid a decent amount of money when I worked there but they would let anyone attend the school even if it was someone that they knew couldn't afford it. While I worked there one of my bosses broke the law by filling out a FAFSA for a student over the phone. When I reported this to my boss, I got pulled in a conference room and was grilled by his boss and accused of lying. Luckily, I had good people that worked close to me and they backed up what I was saying.
Most likely, I will have to get a lawyer involved to settle all of this but it is going to be a huge pain.
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