Bluefield College

Review: I have been attending Bluefield College since April of 2012. I would have been attending since January of 2012 but they failed to request any of my transcripts (which I paid for them to request) from my previous colleges. They kept stating that I could not enroll in classes until they received my transcripts. I called my past college ([redacted] Community College) and spoke with the registrars office and they stated they had never received any requests from Bluefield. I asked them to send them the transcripts and they received them within days. I had the identical issue with the other college I had attended prior ([redacted] College). Bluefield stated they were still awaiting transcripts for approximately 8 months. I finally contacted Bridgewater and requested the transcripts and the Bluefield received them right away. I asked Bluefield to refund the money I paid at admission for them to request my transcripts ($20 or so I believe) and Bluefield stated they had no record of this payment. I have had ongoing communication issues with the college which does not have an adviser assigned to help me. I have to fumble my way through figuring out what classes I need without the Colleges assistance. Anytime I email practically anybody they do not respond. Even the president of my program failed to give me a grade after I took a class with him. He didn't log ANY grades in my gradebook and then I had to bug him for 2 months after the class ended just to get a grade for the class. I currently have a class that ended months ago and it still says "in progress". I can't get the registrar's office to return my emails to discuss it. I also had the college fail to set up my financial aid one semester and sent me a bill for the entire amount of classes. They stated that I "didn't ask for financial aid". I presented the emails where I was asking them for assistance with what paperwork was needed as well as the fact that I provided the paperwork but they insisted that "I didn't ask for it"... Neverending issues with communication. I emailed the president with my concerns last year and he didn't even reply. I have several friends that also attend Bluefield and report the identical issues.Desired Settlement: All I would like is to be treated professionally. When I have a question I would like an answer. This kind of lack of professionalism might pass by with your average student but not with people like myself that work in professional environments. If the people I supervised in my residential program were this unprofessional I would address it immediately. I do not recommend Bluefield to anyone despite my extreme excitement to start this program over a year ago (even after the delayed start). The saddest part is that I must continue my education with Bluefield. My degree in the end is going to have the name of an organization that I don't want to be associated with at all. Its amazing that an organization can continue to operate like this. If it was a single incident or maybe even 5 incidents I would just hash it up to mistakes. I have seriously had 20-30 issues with Bluefield. Never ceases to amaze me. [redacted] is the only person at Bluefield that does a decent job.

Business

Response:

July 24, 2013To Whom It May Concern:In response to the customer’s statement of the problem, we did find that the customer’s concern regarding the College’s failure to request transcripts did occur. Unfortunately, we had an employee dealing with cancer at that time and during the transition of personnel, the customer’s file was overlooked. Once College personnel discovered what had happened we did contact the customer by phone and by email and have records to that fact. In addition, the customer’s credit card which was charged a $5 fee was credited back to his credit card account on December 20, 2011, the day of the charge. The customer can check with his credit card company to see this information. The College does have copies and records to support this. There was never a $20 charge.We are saddened to learn of the customer’s concern with ongoing communication issues with the College including that he was not assigned an advisor. The customer does in fact have an advisor and all students attending our College are assigned an academic advisor to assist students in class selection and other academic related issues. This customer’s advisor is actually the Dean of the College of Professional Programs. This information is sent to students from our registrar’s office.Regarding the posting of academic grades, the College has a policy that all grades for continuing students are due in the registrar’s office no later than two weeks after the last class period. For graduating students, grades are due the Monday following graduation. At no time has any faculty member gone two weeks or longer without turning in grades for a class. It is possible the customer is having problems viewing the information in the Student Portal that provides students access to their academic and other College related information. We verified this information today and the customer’s record is complete and all grades for classes this customer participated in have been logged in his account and show on the customer’s academic transcript. There is no course showing “In Progress.”Regarding the issue of not replying to email, we did discover while investigating all claims made by this customer that he had in fact been communicating with employees who no longer work for the College. The customer should have been receiving an automated notice that the employee was no longer with the College. We do have copies of over 96 email responses to the customer regarding various issues where College personnel did in fact respond to each question, some in great detail including copies of screen shots to help explain what we were needing regarding missing financial aid documents. The customer goes on to state that he can’t get the registrar to respond to emails, but we have copies of over 41 email responses from our registrar with the customer.The customer states that he had the College fail to set up his financial aid one semester. It is the student’s responsibility to ensure all financial aid documentation is complete and accurate. The College is not responsible for a student’s failure to submit paperwork in a timely manner nor is the College responsible to request loan monies for a student who completes a financial aid form and does not request loans for a particular period. In this particular case, the customer requested loans for the spring semester but failed to request a loan for the summer session. The College has copies of all submitted financial aid documentation to verify this fact. The College is not allowed to disburse a loan or any financial aid for a student who is not enrolled and the customer requested a loan to cover the session after the academic session was over and the student was no longer enrolled as a student. Please know that we make every effort to ensure we are in compliance with all federal and state mandates for the issuing of financial aid.Bluefield College takes great pride in providing quality service to all of our students. It is our goal that everyone be treated fairly and with respect. College personnel do not intentionally fail to respond to email or phone requests when students need assistance. We would welcome the opportunity to meet with the customer and discuss the situation further, if needed.

Consumer

Response:

I have reviewed the response offer made by the business in reference to complaint ID [redacted], and have determined that this proposed action would not resolve my complaint. For your reference, details of the offer I reviewed appear below. Very unsatisfied with the response that Bluefield College has provided for my complaint. The approach Bluefield has taken is simply to not take accountability for anything that has taken place. Not a single shred of an apology or responsibility. Perfect example of the customer service model that Bluefield has in place. I hope their response stays viewable to the public as I feel it supports my case more than detracts from it. Having a staff member out with Cancer is a horrible attempt to explain why my transcripts were not received despite my continued requests. I first applied to Bluefield in December of 2011. I was not started in classes until 4/2012 due to the delay in transcripts. At no time did Bluefield explain anything other than “we have not received your transcripts”. They did not state “We are unable to REQUEST your transcripts due to an employee being out”. I had to take the initiative and request my transcripts myself. I then continued to request the transcripts for when I attended [redacted] College. So my transcripts should have been requested in December of 2011. I requested them in March 2012 and was able to start classes in April. I then followed up in January of 2013 about my still outstanding transcripts from [redacted] College. Was your employee out with cancer for a year? My email on 1/28/13 “XXXX,Thank you for the response. Can you please look into getting my [redacted] College transcript. I completed all the paperwork and payment to do so when I first enrolled. I had to do the legwork to get my BRCC transcript to Bluefield because Bluefield never requested it despite me completing the process. Can Bluefield actually get my [redacted] College transcript so I dont have to do the work again.... I would rather not take Biology over again...” And again my email on 2/25/13 “XXXX,I went ahead and requested my [redacted] College Transcript due to never getting a response about you doing it. I sent a copy to Bluefield and a copy to myself. I received my copy today. Can you verify that you received a copy of my official transcript?” Please see below correspondence in which I inquired as to the fee for attaining my transcripts. The question was on 2/25/13 and response on 2/28/13: From: [redacted] Sent: Monday, February 25, 2013 9:46 PMTo: XXXXXXXXXSubject: Transcript Request Fee “XXXX,I am trying to remember correctly, did I pay Bluefield a fee to get my transcripts requested from other colleges? I am pretty sure I did but I wanted to double check.Thanks,[redacted]” “Hi [redacted], I have looked in the system and cannot see where you did but that was so long ago I cannot remember. Plus [redacted] is no longer with Bluefield College.” I have an advisor?! I spoke with my other friends that attend Bluefield and they also stated they do not have advisors. If you could forward me the email that advised me of this I will be happy to recant! Now, I can at least utilize my advisors job title to look up who it is so I can contact them!! I received my grade in SOC 3153 (summer session 2012) in December of 2012. That is hardly 2 weeks. My advising worksheet showed that I received an F (0) until then. However, as soon as the registrar had my grade (December) it then showed up. Several of my friends had the identical experience. You would be correct that none of my classes now show “in progress”. It took 15 days of requesting which included 3 emails and a voicemail before I got a response. As a matter of fact the response didn’t even mention the “in progress” but it is now in fact fixed. Again you are correct in the fact that I have had responses to all of my emails. However, having to email over and over just to bug people enough to finally respond is not satisfactory in my eyes. I have often had to cc other bluefield employees to help get a response. I had to get other bluefield staff to bug Mr. [redacted] to respond to my request to get a grade for my class. Go ask him about it. I will be happy to forward all the emails. I understand that it is my responsibility to set up financial aid. I supplied all requested paperwork. However, despite emailing about my paperwork the office states I “failed to request financial aid”. How did I do so when I was emailing the office asking if they had all the proper paperwork to administer my financial aid? Did I really need to say “here is all my paperwork for financial aid. Yes, I do in fact want financial aid”. I was hoping that maybe this complaint would finally get a decent response from Bluefield but apparently I was wrong. Bluefield has had since January of 2012 to prove themselves and they have let me down over and over again. Due to sinking lots of money into Bluefield I cannot walk away or I would have long ago. Hopefully at some point they will start to focus on customer service and the students who should be valuable to them.Regards,[redacted]