I felt that the students deserve to know about my experience since they to May find themselves in a similar situation. I have been a student at Ashworth since 2009. I was enrolled in the Bachelor's of Business Administration. I had 5 classes to be complete with my degree. Three months ago I had a foot injury. I have been out of work. Unfortunately I fell behind in my payments. So the school sent my account to their collection agency Abiility. I was more than happy to pay the agency, until one of their representatives called me an idiot. Literally I asked to speak to a manager and she said "This is a collection agency, he is not going to care what you have to say. What are you, an idiot?" So I called the school and was able to get the lady in the finance department to take my payment.
I understand collection agents are allowed to be aggressive, but it just seemed so wrong that this agent was representing my educational provider and used the term "idiot" with a student. It seemed to me that because she represented the school, it was the equivalent of a professor calling me an idiot. So I refused to deal with them. In May, my doctor tried to send me back to work, but my employer refused to accept my limitations. This meant a delay in income while the LOA process was restarted. So unfortunately I fell behind again.
I called the school today to get information on getting back into school. The first person I spoke to was very rude. I asked to speak to her manager. I explained to the manager that I refused to deal with the collection agency. I explained to her that the representative called me an idiot. But she refused to let me work directly with the school. I find that amazing! How could a school allow their representatives call their students idiot? How could the last time they accepted my payment at the school, but refused to now? It's not like I'm trying to skip out on my payment. It's just I want to deal with people who are respectful.
Needless to say, I refuse to deal with Ability. I will pay off my debt with the school, but I cannot in good conscience do business with an educational institution that does not value their students. It is a shame, because I was actually planning on taking a couple of other programs with the school. As a customer for a for profit school, I was looking to continue spending money for about another 6 years. Now not only will I not be spending anymore money, I will not even graduate from this school. I would rather spend my money in an institution that is supportive. There is plenty of options out there for me. As long as the school treats their students this way, they will continue to lose market share.
