My experience with Scheidegger

[RXRob]

I've read some of the posts in this forum about Scheidegger and thought that I would share my expeiences.

I signed up to the CISCO course at the end of 2004, by two salesmen who came to my house after I replied to an advert.

I took up the course because I would get as many attempts as I needed for each assignment, I would be able to see my tutor locally twice a year for some face to face tuition, I would be given relevant job interviews when I finished and I could cancel it all 28 days if I wasn't happy. So I passed the entyry test with 90% and signed up.

After failing the first assignment twice with between 60-70%, I decided that the course wasn't for me and cancelled, but was told that I couldn't as the 5 days had passed. I told them taht I had 28 days, not 5, they disagreed, so I cancelled the Standing Order.

For the past 18 months they have been threatening legal action, but nothing has come of it yet.

They also say that I am still enrolled, so where my contact with my tutor has been I don't know as I don't even have a name or gender him/her yet.

Anyhoo, the reason for this post is that I would like to get into contact with anyone else going through the same thing with this company so that we can share experiences with them.

My email is RXRob@hotmail.co.uk

Don't let yourself get bullied by faceless companies!

[RXRob]

Just a quick update. I have already received a couple of emails which made some interesting reading. The more I hear about Scheidegger the more fishy it all seems.

Since they began threatening legal action my case has referred to the Credit Information Bureau, who recently wrote to me with an offer of restarting the course along with cheaper repayments of £40.00 per month.

I wrote to them yesterday accepting the offer, on condition that the promises that were made to me are kept, here is a copy of the letter

Dear Mr Smith
Thank you for your letter dated 16 March 2006. Having sought advice I am prepared to accept your offer and begin the course again along with making repayments of £40.00 per month.
However, you should be aware that the reason for this dispute occurring was that I was mis-sold the course by a salesman, and therefore cancelled the Standing Order until the issue was resolved. Please only pay in the enclosed cheque if you and your client can abide by the following promises that were made to me when I was sold the course. Failure to adhere will result in payment being cancelled again.
1. The course tutor will travel the country, giving me chance to meet him/her twice per calender year. I am still officially on the course, and have not yet received notification of one of these meetings in over two years.
2. My tutor will be in constant contact with me through telephone and e-mail, and be available to answer any questions from me at least five days per week. In over two years I still do not know my tutors name or gender.
3. I may attempt each exam of the course as many times as is necessary to pass the course at no extra charge.
4. Upon successful completion of the course I will be guaranteed job interviews for vacancies related to the course.

If there are any problems or issues arising from this letter then please do not hesitate to contact me on XXXXX XX XX XX, or write to me at the above address.

Yours Faithfully

Robert Coats

I get the feeling that is may not be too long before I am cancelling my payment again.

[nightowl]

Sounds like a scam to me, I never signed up for Scheidegger but Ive been following the Scheidegger threads here on this website.

Type in Scheidegger in the search function and you will find alot of threads on this place. Its not good from what ive been reading.......Jim

[RXRob]

I got a phone call in response to my letter.

According to their records, a letter was sent to me in December 2004, introducing me to my team of tutors. I have replied to this letter, according to their records.

The letter is going to be sent to me again, and I will be restarting the course.

To recap. Nearly 18 months of cancelled payments, threatened legal action from 3 different companies, and a lot of aggro going both ways would have been prevented if I had spoken to the nice man that I spoke to today, instead the patronising operators that answer the incoming calls.

I still don't trust the company for a second, but they've accepted my conditions now, strengthening any court case that may arise if they break their promises again.

[Fifer]

To all of U who are doing a Skills Train course, whether Ur experience so far is good or bad, I urge U to make enquiries about the venues for final exams B4 going any further. Many of the people who do these courses, do so because they cannot get out and about easily. Here's what happened to me:

Firstly a bit about myself. I'm 60 yrs of age and physically disabled due to an accident I had 4 years ago. I still cannot travel long distances without suffering adverse affects.

In January 2006 I received a 'phone call from a Skills- Train rep, who said he'd heard I'd been enquiring about a computer course. At the time I was in the middle of an ECDL course but had changed from Windows '98 to XP and my PC wasn't recognising the disk, so I thought he was referring to that and allowed him to visit. Biggest mistake of my life! He told me the ECDL was no longer running and talked me into doing the course on Computer Book-keeping for a SAGE Diploma. I told him I already had an HNC in accounts, but he said I'd have to start again from scratch as I'd gotten the HNC in 1984
He spoke at length about how I'd need something to fall back on once August arrived and I became a pensioner. He was so plausible and seemed so honest & nice that I had no reason to suspect he was telling me a load of lies. He gave me a very simple arithmetic test which I passed with flying colours and said I should have no difficulty in completing the course within 6 months.

He told me there would be 2 social functions at a local hotel, where I'd meet up with other Scheidegger students for refreshments etc, giving me something to look forward to as I do not get out much. (These events never did take place)! He then went out to his car and returned with a briefcase full of stationery etc which he handed to me. He went through the contents of the briefcase and showed them to me.

He then produced what looked like one single agreement and said all that was left was for me to sign up with his company. I asked if I could have time to look over the agreement but he looked at his watch and said he still had another call to make and was running short of time, which meant I had to sign the agreement there & then. I looked over the agreement as best I could, but I was feeling under pressure to sign and would have been too embarrassed to do otherwise. After all he'd told me there was a cooling off period and I thought I could simply contact him to say I'd changed my mind.

The document just looked like one single agreement to me. I did not suspect that part of it was actually a separate agreement between myself and a Financial company, giving them permission to pay Skills Train £1,800 and charge it to me.

He then said he had to call his office on his mobile in order to set up the account. He seemed to know the person on the other end, so it appeared that he was indeed talking with someone at Skills Train. He had told me that I had a 3 day cooling off period during which I could get back to him and cancel.

What I did not know was that I actually had 14 days and should have received written confirmation of this within the next couple of days. I never did receive that information and only found out how long I'd actually had to cancel, ten months later during a telephone conversation with a woman at the Scheidegger office.

I actually tried repeatedly that evening and over the next 3 days, to contact Mr McKenzie and cancel, but he didn't answer his 'phone. I tried to contact Skills Train over the internet but could find no 'Contact Us' link on their site. In the end I felt that I'd just have to accept the course and do the best I could. I attained high marks on all of the tests (between 90% and 100%).

There was no way I could have completed the course in the next 6 months, as I'd to wait at least a week for the results each time I sent a TMA to the tutor. It was 10 mths before I reached the point where I received the SAGE package, and that was when I discovered that the nearest venue for the final exams was at Glasgow, almost 50 miles away!

I contacted the exams board who confirmed this, and was told they're even making students travel as far as Luton nowadays. I contacted Scheidegger and was told they might be able to send an invigilator to my house, but that I (now a pensioner) would have to pay all his/her costs beforehand & be reimbursed at a later date. By this time I was extremely upset and actually having asthma & angina attacks. I 'phoned Clydesdale Finance who warned me that if I didn't keep up the payments they would have me black-listed. I approached the Office of Trading Standards who did a full investigation and took my case to the Financial Ombudsman, who decided that since Clydesdale Financial Services had paid out the money for my course, to Scheidegger, they were legally entitled to be repaid.

3 weeks ago I received a 'phone call from yet another Skills Train rep, saying he'd heard I was interested in doing one of their courses. You can guess what he was told! My number is unlisted, so they must just be chancing their luck and 'phoning people at random