Refund storm： What is the routine of the public examination training agreement class？

　　BEIJING, Beijing, November 25 (Zhang Yuhui) On the 26th, the written examination of public subjects in the 2024 national examination will be held soon. According to the National Civil Service Bureau, the national examination plans to recruit 39,600 people. By the end of online registration and qualification examination, a total of 3.033 million people have passed the qualification examination of the employer, and the ratio of the number of qualified people to the number of employment plans is about 77:1.

　　There are such a group of candidates who are racing against time to prepare for the upcoming written test, but they are also experiencing a wave of refund of fees that spans two years.

　　In recent years, public examination training has become an industrial chain. In order to stand out from the competition, some candidates are determined to invest in themselves. However, what is waiting for them is not the guarantee of refund even if they fail, but the routine of the public examination training agreement class.

　　Routine 1: "But no refund"

　　After the failure of the public examination in 2022, Cheng Yan (pseudonym) began her nearly one-year road to safeguarding rights. Unlike the 30-45 days agreed in the agreement to submit the refund formalities and verify them, she didn’t receive the long-deserved refund of 40 thousand yuan until the end of May this year. Nowadays, a group of candidates who signed up for the 2023 public examination training agreement class embarked on the road she had traveled and struggled in the difficult rights protection.

　　Song Ming (a pseudonym) is one of them. In August, 2022, he signed up for the full-course agreement class of written examination and interview in a training institution, and signed an agreement with the institution, which stipulated in detail the conditions, standards and handling procedures of the refund. After Song Ming failed to "land" successfully, he applied to the training institution for refund of training fees. However, from the submission of the refund formalities on August 8 to now, he has not waited for the 36,500 yuan refund promised by the training institution.

　　"There is no following when submitting the refund information, and the same is true for others. Everyone is stuck with tens of thousands of dollars in the organization." The experience of Song Ming and other students who are defending their rights stems from the "no refund" promised by the organization at that time.

　　Zhongxin. com searched on social platforms and found that students who signed up for the "no refund" public examination training class abound. According to the analysis of some education experts, the students failed the exam, which is caused by two factors, one is teaching, and the other is learning. However, the business model of "no return, no return" attributes all the students to the teaching side, which is equivalent to giving the students a blank check.

　　The storm of refund is getting worse. According to Song Ming, now, the training institution he signed up for has cancelled the full-refund agreement class and changed to fail the exam and refund part of the money. An intermediary of the training institution told Zhongxin. com that at present, there are three charging methods for the provincial examination agreement class in 2024, among which students can pay 22,999 yuan in advance and refund 5,000 yuan after being hired. Although the refund fee has been reduced, the "promise" of "no refund" continues.

　　Routine 2: From "No Money to Retire" to "Retire by Stages"

　　In August last year, the list of candidates for the provincial examination positions and the positions for adjustment, replacement and re-recording in a certain province was announced, and Liu Jia (pseudonym) decided to fail in the provincial examination. When I took the exam, it was an epidemic. Liu Jia and the students who also signed up for the agreement class took risks and took part in the whole process of the exam. The reason was that the agreement stipulated that only by taking the relevant links of the exam could I get a refund after failing the exam. "The public exam training is very expensive, and I still have friends who smashed 50,000 to 60,000." However, after she applied for a refund from the training institution, the institution declined in October saying that "there is no money to refund" and proposed that she could go to the written test class for two months in the second half of the year. After Liu Jia refused, from December to January this year, the agency proposed to Liu Jia to refund the fees by stages.

　　The agreement signed between Liu Jia and the training institution stipulates that "Party A will pay the refund amount to the bank account provided by Party B within 30-45 working days after receiving the complete refund formalities submitted by Party B and verifying that the materials are true and meet the refund conditions", and there is no mention of the refund in installments. "If I don’t agree to ask for a full refund in installments, I may not be able to refund it when, so I accepted the installment refund proposed by the organization with the mentality of getting it back first." However, after receiving several refunds, in June this year, the institution stopped the refund, which was about 6,000 yuan short of the promised refund of 19,800 yuan.

　　There are also students who disagree with the installment refund that is not stated in the agreement, as Cheng Yan did. "At that time, many people on the Internet suggested not to accept staging, so I refused. They have already broken the contract and said that they will be phased. Who knows if they will abide by the agreement? " Cheng Yan believes that if the training institutions have integrity, they should refund the fees on time, and should not "make another mistake".

　　After the phased refund of fees stopped, Liu Jia began to complain about the training institutions to the 12345 hotline, the Education Commission, the petition departments and other forces. Later, Liu Jia learned that the agency seemed to be "rich again". After many complaints and help, Liu Jia finally got a full refund in October this year. At the same time, Song Ming accepted the installment refund with a total value of nearly 40,000 yuan, but only received one issue and never heard back. "As long as you don’t complain about them, it’s nothing."

　　In June this year, Jiangsu Consumer Protection Committee announced the results of a special survey on the education and training industry for the postgraduate entrance examination, which involved six public examination institutions. The survey results show that the refund process is cumbersome and the training institutions shirk their responsibilities. According to the survey, 38.9% of the respondents indicated that they had had the experience of refunding fees, among which 81.1% of the respondents indicated that they encountered unreasonable fee deduction or refused to refund fees. The main manifestations of the cumbersome refund were harsh conditions, failure to refund fees according to the agreement, long refund time, cumbersome refund procedures, refusal to refund fees and changing classes. In addition, judging from the complaints, in the process of refund, consumers often encounter the situation that staff members lose contact and institutions shirk their responsibilities, which makes it difficult to refund fees.

　　Routine 3: "Go through legal procedures"

　　"I can’t retreat, you can go through legal procedures." After the application for refund failed, some students waited for such a sentence from the training institution.

　　According to the data of Sky Eye Survey, among the main causes of judicial cases in an education and training institution, there are 292 disputes related to education and training contracts, ranking first. Among them, 117 cases have been closed and 175 cases have not been closed.

　　The cause of action of an education and training institution involved in judicial cases is in the top ten. The picture comes from Tianyancha.

　　After decisively rejecting the installment refund proposed by the institution, Cheng Yan initiated a lawsuit on the electronic litigation platform of the court where the institution belongs. After filing the case, the court suggested that Cheng Yan withdraw the lawsuit and told her that she would supervise the institution to refund the full amount at the agreed time, and she received the refund after withdrawing the lawsuit. The whole process lasted for more than half a year, but fortunately Cheng Yan finally received a full refund.

　　Cheng Yan mentioned that there are two ways to resolve the disputes in the agreement, namely "bringing a lawsuit to the people’s court" and "applying to the Arbitration Commission for arbitration". A person who provides legal services related to education and training contract disputes told Zhongxin.com that everyone’s training agreement is different. "Agreed litigation can only be litigation, and agreed arbitration can only be arbitration." After submitting the arbitration application and passing the pre-trial, the complainant needs to pay an arbitration fee of 17,000 yuan to the arbitration commission in advance, which shall be borne by the losing party after the case is concluded. The legal service person said that arbitration is final and the result is faster.

　　"I haven’t learned how to go through legal procedures. I only know that I have spent a lot of energy and money." In order to wait for the refund, Song Ming was exhausted.

　　This refund storm is still to be continued.