I had enrolled for a ‘Certified Financial Planner’ (CFP) course from Bajaj Capital’s ‘International College of Financial Planning’ (ICOFP) institute. The institute failed to meet any of its commitment (false promises made by one of their sales person (‘Vineet Pawar’) and now is not refunding my amount of Rupees Eighteen Thousand (Rs.18,000/).
The sales team (Vineet) sets wrong / high expectations with students and later it is left for the student to fight with the institute for refund. It’s similar to a situation where an advisor – for commission - sells ‘incorrect’ financial product to an investor and it’s for the investor to chase the company for refund. Is this how Bajaj Capital expects the CFPs (churned out from their institute) to sell financial products in the market?
I tried to resolve my issue with the institute in two attempts; however despite of not meeting their commitment they are now refusing to refund my amount.
First Attempt: I had given written feedback to ‘Vineet’ (Sales) expressing my dissatisfaction with the teaching methodology and that I hadn’t received my books. I had asked Vineet to process my refund if the institute fails to send me the books by 1st week of April.
On 9th April 2010, I spoke to Vineet and he said the refund is being processed. I escalated my issues to the Director (Ms. Vani Bajaj) of the institute and met her in-person on 1st May 2010. She persuaded me to give it another chance and assured me of better / improved quality of classes and refund in case of failure (I have documented all the points and had sent her an e-mail on 1st of May).
Reason of Cancellation: In addition to the list of issues mentioned below; the main reason why I want to cancel my registration with ICOFP is that, not even one promise – made to me – was kept.

Issues:
1. I was promised that I will get my set of books within 48 hours of making the payment. From 23rd March till 10th of May (eventually I got ‘some’ and not all books during the week of 10th May’10), I got only one book ‘Investment Planning’; and that too I had to collect it from ITO office and after multiple follow ups.
2. Even though Financial Calculator was part of the deal, I had to purchase my own Financial Calculator (worth Rs.2000/); as it was not available with ICOFP. Faculty on day one said, “You will not understand anything unless you have the Calculator”. Hence I had to buy it on my own.
3. TAX Faculty, on day 1 announced that “I have only 24 hours to ‘complete’ the course, so you (students) better be fast to grasp. My job is to complete the course and I assure you that you will get passing marks”….. Now, I didn’t join ICOFP to just “PASS” my exam. I went there to learn.
4. Mode of teaching – The teaching methodology is all about ‘How to use a calculator’
5. For more than three weeks (from 9th April onwards) I was chasing Vineet – as he was my only point of contact - for refund / cancellation of my enrollment; Vineet never asked me to send a ‘formal’ e-mail. Further delaying the refund process.
6. Had given a ‘formal’ (written) feedback to Vineet on 3rd/4th (weekend) of April 2010; not sure what has been done about it.
7. I was told by Vineet that I will get my refund on 1st of May; however, nothing was done.

I had ‘repeatedly’ set the expectations with Vineet that I need classes as Finance is not my background and preferably put me into a batch where ICOFP have non-finance background students. To which Vineet’s response was….“Don’t worry!!”
Enrollment Details:
Course: CFP from International College Of Financial Planning
Date of Enrollment: 23rd March 2010
Date of ‘Trial’ classes: Starting from March 27th weekend till my batch starts from May’10 (at no additional cost) My Classes were to start from May 2010 Receipt # 21257
Second Attempt: On Ms Vani Bajaj’s request / recommendation, I started my batch on 22nd May 2010. The classes didn’t meet the expectations set by Ms Bajaj / Vineet. As agreed between me and Ms.Bajaj, I gave her my documented feedback on 27th May 2010.
Reason (s):
1. Teaching methodology – The focus is on use of calculator only and is not conducive to my learning
2. Same as last time: Same faculty, same class duration, same teaching style, if nothing had changed then I was sure the result (me not understanding the concepts) will not change either.
3. Knowledge vs. Corporate Series classes: I am convinced that there is no difference between the two. (In addition to point #2) More than 50% of the students in the current (“knowledge” series) batch are from last (“Corporate” series) batch, which I had joined temporarily. However, their sales team is misguiding the students by giving wrong information to students.
4. I still have not received the refund of calculator yet

I am victim of misguidance / overselling of the product (classes) by ICOFP salesperson. For no fault of mine, I am being penalized for Rs.18,000 /- (Eighteen Thousand Rupees).
Per Ms. Bajaj’s recommendation I gave the situation another chance and it didn’t work out. Ref to our meeting on 1st of May’10, she had asked me to connect with her directly, if there is any challenge and that she will help me to get my money back.
Now the institute is blaming me for not doing the due diligence; and is now hiding behind 15 days clause refund policy.
What about institute not meeting any of their commitments? What about sales team selling the product incorrectly? What about me chasing the institute since 9th of April?

Regards,
Pankaj Bhatia