College Funding Advisors

Review: Misleading of key condition of the service

We attended Mr.[redacted] workshop on Sept. 2nd regarding student financial aid. After presentation, he suggested us to make an personal appointment with him. We came to appointment on Sept. 7 with our information and questions concerning private school financial aid. He reviewed our information and tried to sell us a package which we don't need at that time. We declined his first package. Then he was upset with our rejection. We tried to explain our purpose to him if we can receive any financial aid for our daughter. Then he showed us on paper he could help us to receive around $3000/yr if my daughter get accepted from this college. We paid $500 for his service. After a week later for next appointment on Sept.14, he asked us to set up a limited liability company first in order to be qualify this financial aid in the near future. We were surprised to hear this suggestion and process. Later he gave us a folder which will help us to fill up the FASAS application. Desired Settlement: We were mislead by Mr. [redacted] to seek his service and advice. He should tell us in more explicit way of this process to seek for financial aid. We don't think this kind of service and advice is worth what we paid for.

Business

Response:

Initial Business Response

Contact Name and Title: [redacted] - owner

Contact Phone: XXX-XXX-XXXX

Contact Email: [redacted]@aol.com

I had two meetings with this family totaling 2.5 hours. They own rental property. The Dept of Education counts these properties when they calculate financial eligibility as if the equity were cash in the bank. On July 1, 2006, the DOE published a report on how to be able to eliminate rentals from the FAFSA form. It stated that if the properties income were reported on a schedule C rather then a schedule E, then it would be considered a business and all the rentals would not have to be reported on the aid applications. The way to do this was outlined in the DOE report. It stated if the rental properties were owned by a corporation "in order to be excluded, as the small business exclusion only applies to the business and its assets."

Additionally, I prepared the answer keys to the Free Application for Federal Student Aid so that the [redacted] could easily complete the form online.

At no time have they registered a complaint to our firm either by phone call or email.

Final Consumer Response

(The consumer indicated he/she DID NOT accept the response from the business.)

The information from the first meeting is misleading resulting in making wrong decision. He showed us on paper that he could help us to receive about $3200 financial aid if our daughter gets accepted by private college by his service. Once we pay the service fee of $500 to him, he will give us the information of how to fill up FAFSA application in the 2nd meeting. He didn't explain, disclose or give us very explicit direction to us how he is going help us to receive this financial aid in the 1st meeting. When we came for 2nd meeting, he told us to set up a LLC in order to be qualified for financial aid. The cost to setup LLC in California will be about $1500. Every year we have to pay Franchise Board minimum $800. Why Mr. [redacted] didn't inform us there will be additional cost ? He did not give us an informed decision. If we had known the additional cost, time and trouble, we wouldn't use his service at all. The service or advice is not cost effective nor benefit us in this situation

Final Business Response

I do not explain how we are going to eliminate the rental properties at the first interview because if we do that, we are giving away information for free. On the 2nd meeting after our fee has been paid, we give the client a copy of the instruction from the Dept of Education that explains how and why setting up an LLC will remove the total value and equity in rental property from the financial aid application. The meeting includes a verbal review of the printed material and the opportunity for Q&A. I also gave this client a copy of the completed answer keys for the FAFSA. This service is worth the $500 charge all by itself. All of the services that I promised were performed and completed.

It seems that the services we purchased were really supplied by the [redacted].
[redacted], it seems, earns his income through selling families additional financial planning services. Much of the advice he offered us would have cost us a lot of money in penalties, while likely earning him substantial commissions. (We sought second opinion from our CPA). Once it was clear to him that we were not going to by his additional financial packages, he became rude and lost interest in helping us entirely. Seemingly bait and switch behavior.
We (and our daughter) are now stuck, based on poor advice from [redacted], with a very expensive and very limited field of college options. We are now stuck with only private colleges to choose from based on [redacted]'s advice and his over reliance on "merit based scholarships" from the institutions with "deep endowment buckets" that have just not materialized as suggested.
The entire experience with [redacted] was similar to agreeing to a time-share seminar attendance in order to "win" a vacation, with no vacation. Old school sales practices and intimidation. I agree with the other Revdex.com reviewers here too that he is just plane rude.
Had I the chance to avoid [redacted] altogether, I would.
To be fair, the [redacted] (of which [redacted] appears to be a re-seller for) has been a silver lining in all of this and helpful.
VERY disappointed and would not advice this service provider. The company is called College Funding Advisors.
PS - he also seems to have difficulty speaking with women. All of our meetings were with my wife and I, and I could count, on one hand, how many times he would answer her questions while looking at her. He seemed to always want to address the male. Disrespectful at best, old school car salesman behavior. He seems, at first, like a nice guy with honorable intentions and expertise. But I would disagree with that entirely now.

Ron has been awesome! A free workshop and then a free hour and a half of his time! We appreciate how much he invested in us before we were even clients! Now that we are clients, the red carpet just gets longer and longer! He lowered our EFC by $2000 and is helping us pick the right school for our daughter. She wanted to go to ASU, but thanks to Ron, we are now seriously considering Yale! There is no way we could have navigated this process without him.

Review: I am going to copy and paste the letter I asked my attorney to write Mr. Maiewski below:

The Law Offices of [redacted] and [redacted] May 30, 2014

Mark Maiewski

College Funding Advisors, LLC [redacted] Harrisonburg, VA [redacted] RE: Complaint

Dear Mr. Maiewski:

I am writing on behalf of my clients, regarding their dissatisfaction with your services. They paid you $5000 each to assist their children with the college application process and to complete and file financial aid applications. You obtained detailed financial information from them and supplied them with a financial roadmap assuring them of their ability to afford their children's college education, with included Federal grants.

They problem they experienced with your services is that you filed a FAFSA on their behalf and did not accurately disclose their information on the form. My clients had no way of discovering the inaccuracies because you filed the forms on their behalf online and had all confirmations and communications directed to your e-mail address without designating yourself as a "preparer" on the form. With respect to [client 1], you falsely reported her daughter, as residing with her father. With respect to [client 2], you failed to report [client 2] mutual fund assest. In both cases, the schools accused my clients of committing fraud by submitting false information on a Federal form and threatened to disqualify their children from admission to their schools. My clients fully cooperated with the schools and answered all the questions truthfully in order to resolve the situation. Unfortunately, they did not receive the financial aid promised by your roadmap and they are incurring substantial additional costs for their children's education.

You provided a written Guaranty in which you promised that if your clients "are not 100% totally blown away by the results" you will gladly refund their investment. You advertise that they can try your services with "NO RISK WHATSOEVER" and that they "have absolutely NOTHING to lose."

In accordance with your guaranty, please refund $5000 to [clients 1 and 2] as soon as possible. I look forward to hearing from you within 10 days to avoid any further legal action.

Thank you for your attention to this matter.

Sincerely yours, [redacted]Desired Settlement: I would like to get a refund.

Also, what this company has done is criminal.

They are committing fraud on Federal Forms for the sake of receiving Federal Grants with false information.

College Funding Advisors LLC are filling out the forms in the "name" of others who are unsuspecting or given false advice.

College Funding Advisors do not sign the forms as "preparers" or allow their clients access to their own FAFSA information.

All of this is illegal and and constitutes fraud which is punishable by law.

This needs to be reported to the Attorney General.

College Funding Advisors LLC is cheating the Federal Government

Business

Response:

In response to Ms. [redacted] complaint, I am writing to inform you of certain facts to illustrate

that Ms, [redacted] account of what transpired between her and my firm is not correct in the

following key respects:

1. Our guarantee to Ms. [redacted] stipulated that she would receive an amount equal

to or greater than her investment with us. She invested $4,997.00. With our assistance

and advisories her son [redacted] was admitted to the college of his choice and he received

$43,145 in financial aid for the first year alone.

2. Assisting or completing FAFSA applications is not an act of fraud. In fact, it is

standard best practice in the college planning advice industry. As with IRS filings,

the Client alone is responsible for all facts represented therein.

3. We routinely complete FAFSA applications for our clients, providing our email

address for responses in order to allow us to respond in a timely manner to any

complications or requests that might arise in the application process.

We used information provided by Ms. [redacted] to complete her son's application.

As always, we provided Ms. [redacted] with the information to access her FAFSA application

online, We advised her of our updates and provided copies of the changes.

4. We consulted Ms. [redacted] before submitting her son's FAFSA application. The information

in the application was correct at the time we f¡led it based on that information. During our

relationship, Ms. [redacted] made certain financial decisions which had a negative impact on

the process. These included the purchasing of property, the sale of one house and the

purchase of another. She chose to do this without informing or consulting us prior to or

during those purchases. Therefore, we had no opportunity to discuss her change in financial

circumstances and how such changes might affect her son's financial aid.

5. The college that accepted her son for enrollment discovered a difference between the initial

FAFSA submitted and the updated version. Again, Ms. [redacted] was responsible for all facts in

both the original and updated versions. This initially resulted in a reduction in the amount of

financial aid offered by the college and their request for an explanation.

6. At her request, we then advised Ms. [redacted] as to the best way to address discrepancies.

To the best of our knowledge, she followed our advice and appealed the college's decision.

As a result, the full $43,145,00 originally awarded was reinstated by the college. No legal

action was ever taken by the college and they never contacted us during their inquiries.

7. Despite her failure to inform of us of certain of her financial actions and issues that might

have resulted in a major impact on her son's ability to qualify for aid, Ms, [redacted] received

more than 800% return on her investment end a place for her son in his chosen college.

8. We fulfilled our promise to Ms. [redacted] in a legal and ethical way. She doe¡ not deserve a

refund.

Sincerely,

President, College Funding Advisors, LLC

Consumer

Response:

I have reviewed the response offer made by the business in reference to complaint ID [redacted]1, and have determined that this proposed action would not resolve my complaint. For your reference, details of the offer I reviewed appear below.

Response to 1.

I did not receive $43,145. After the school contacted me after discovering the information was wrong on the FAFSA report submitted by College Funding Advisors they resended all of the aid. I had to work diligently to make them understand that this was a huge misunderstanding on my part hiring such a firm to submit the information.

Response to 2.

I did give College Funding Advisors all of my financial information.

Response to 4.

The purchase of my house was of no consequence to the outcome of this. It wouldn't have mattered if I bought the Empire State Building! I use the sale of mutual funds every single month since the death of my late husband to supplement my income. So there would have been capital gains to report with or without the purchase of another home.

College Funding Advisors is now trying to say that they did not have this information and that I was responsible for the information being submitted. How could I verify this information if I didn't have the pin number to get into the FAFSA? I did not receive the pin numbers to the FAFSA information until I requested them well after the information had been sent to the school and they were calling me questioning the information.

Response to 6.

I did in fact appeal to the school's financial aid committee

No I did not receive the full amount of $43,145 in aid.

Response to 7.

The amount of aid received from the school of choice by my son, was of no way a result of any actions that College Funding Adviors performed.

I have attachments to this email to support the information above.

These attachments along with my complaints have been sent to the Federal Trade Commission, Office of the Inspector General, The Commonwealth Attorney of Harrisonburg, Office of the Attorney General of Richmond and well as the NICCP (the National Institute of Certified College Planners)

There is a link on the Federal Trade Commissions website speaking directly to this type of mis use.

I've posted it below.

Regards,

Business

Response:

Re: [redacted] complaint - ID # [redacted]

Dear [redacted]:

I've retained an attorney in this matter to advise me concerning my legal position and various options. He

has contacted the attorney representing Ms. [redacted].

His name is [redacted] and I authorize you to send any further correspondence and questions you

have for me directly to him.

His mailing address is T[redacted] His email is[redacted]

Mark Maiewski

President, College Funding Advisors, LLC.

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.

Contacted an attorney and she will be handling with business attorney.

Regards,