Shaw Academy

I am attempting to cancel my subscription. The number that the sites requests me to call to cancel will not allow me to cancel my subscription.
I began a free-trial subscription with Shaw Academy online on July 10, 2020. I attempted to cancel my subscription via call to the number on their cancellation page +1 732 702 3123 multiple times today, July 11, 2020 from 1:22 pm to 1:35 pm. My student number is XXXXX. They are not letting me cancel my free-trial subscription. I have placed my debit card on this account and I want it to be removed before I am charged. The site is skills.shawacademy.com.

After canceling membership within the 30 day period this company still charged my bank 70 dollars. The company will not respond to any of my emails.
Please see above.

Shaw academy was not reachable after multiple attempts to cancel service during/after trial period. They continued to bill me twice a month.

I signed up for free trial with an email that was incorrect. I tried to create an account with another email, in hopes that I could cancel the first account. However, the website only allows you to cancel over the phone. After calling them and sitting on hold for an hour, I finally gave up and decided to put my account on hold until I could reach them. They told me on the website by doing that I would not be charged until I unpaused my account, but they still charged me the next month for both accounts ( May 29th & Jun 1st). After not being able to reach them, I had one of the accounts canceled through a third-party app (Truebill), but the other one did not get processed in time. I had to cancel the credit card to end the payments. I did attend one class between both of the accounts and the website would not allow me into the class on time so I missed the beginning of it. I had issues since the first encounter with this service and when I decided within the free trial period that I did not want to continue using it, they made it impossible to cancel. In addition, they falsely claimed that I would not be charged during a hold period when I was.

I signed up for a free trial and received an email to download the app. The app immediately charged me for a "Toolkit" without authorization.
On July 1, 2020 I signed up for a free online class from Shaw Academy. I received an email with instructions to download their iPhone app. Once it was downloaded, I opened the app and was greeted with a message that said "Congratulations! You've unlocked your Course Toolkit." I was immediately charged $39.95 through PayPal. I filed a complaint of an unauthorized charge with PayPal immediately on July 1, 2020. Shaw Academy listed ***@shawacademy.com as their contact for billing, and I immediately wrote to them. I did not attend any of the classes and canceled my subscription on July 6th and not receiving any response. When I signed in and went to their page to cancel, I was reverted to 8 or 9 other pages trying to convince me not to cancel, until I finally got to a page that told me I had to call to cancel. I spoke with Rikaaz A on July 6, 2020 and cancelled my subscription. I was told the only way to request a refund is to email ***@shawacademy.com. I did so right away, and followed up with them on July 11, 2020, but have not received a response. I spoke with my bank, Bank of America, who said they have received a lot of similar complaints since COVID-19 hit the US, but since the transactions are done through PayPal, there is nothing the bank can do. PayPal's response was that "The payment in question was sent as part of a billing agreement you previously set up with the merchant," presumably something in the terms and conditions of the app. The bottom line is that I did not authorize a charge for a useless Toolkit, I did not use the app's services, and I demand a refund.

I asked them for a refund as soon as I subscribed for a free trial and they charged me twice without notice and said they can't refund!
On FB Shaw advertised free course and once I signed up my card was charged $1 and immediately I sent an email to refund AND Cancelled June 28th and they created a ticket: #XXXXXXX. I heard nothing back then my card got charged $34.99 and I sent them more messages, they created more tickets saying they cannot refund and it was too late since it was over a certain time and I told them I told them I wanted a refund and to cancel withing 5 minutes of submitting and they said they cannot refund me. SO frustrating - I sent email after email and when I did a review, they responded apologizing and someone would reach me and NO one had reached out: https://www.trustpilot.com/reviews/5efbdee93f06fXXXXXXXf7db?utm_campaign=review_...⇄

Shaw Academy does not make it able to cancel a customers membership online. Instead it request that you call them in hopes you forget and they can
still charge your card.

unauthorized charge on my credit card. Automatic Subscription charged but never join or click yes to the next class.
I joined shaw academy for 4 weeks free class to see if I could continue but I didn't like the class at all. 7/8 is my last day and I didn't choose continue learning and didn't even click any of their class. They display too much ads and pushing too much to continue their class so the people can easily click on one of buttons. That was really lousy and bothered me a lot. They said that I could simply cancel the membership but they actually make me to call them and they persistently forced to continue the membership. I finally cancelled the membership But They charged me on 7/8 the last day of 4 weeks free sessions. They should never charge anything before the end of the last day, even though I didn't click anything in their next class. They must ask again and confirm that they may charge the membership fee by *** date. This Automatic subscription renewal charging system is a scam. Many companies today notify people before charging fees because of this kind issues. These are messy. This method can make people to offended by this company. I never been notified of this charge while they sending hundreds of text and email about class sales. I never authorized this charge and I want my money back.

Billed for a service I tried to cancel.
My account said I had two free days left of the trial and yet I was billed on a Saturday morning. This is important because when I went to go try to cancel, it turns out you cannot cancel by yourself and you must cancel over the phone during business hours. This information was not made clear to me. It is unethical to not allow someone to cancel online an online product on their own terms. It is also unethical to charge someone during a time when they are not able to cancel the product (such as the weekend).

They told me the product was cancelled on Monday morning, which I believe also removes my access to the product. They told me no refund was possible.

Charged $80 for a membership I cancel, claim it was a certificate which was free and I never received
Hello, my name is ***, and on the 20th of June, I paused my Shaw Academy free membership. The free trial was set to expire on June 23rd, after which I would be charged. On June 21st, I unpaused my membership, which still should have been free, and completely cancelled it. However, I found that two separate charges of $39.95 were still billed to my credit card account. When I asked about this, they told me that those charges were for the eCertificate, which they could not refund me. When I finished my Shaw Academy course, the eCertificate was listed as free. Once I clicked it, nothing else happened. I was not given a link to print a certificate, nor was I given any more updates on it. Not to mention, almost $80 is too much for an eCertificate. Although I keep asking them to refund me my money, they keep telling me that it is against their Terms and Conditions to refund me. Not only that, they keep trying to get me to purchase a membership again by throwing in discounts and free weeks of the courses. At this point, I do not want to keep using their services, I don't even want my (supposedly free at the time) eCertificate. I just want my money back.

Signed up for the trial, cancelled, and was charged
I signed up for the Shaw Academy free month trial and canceled about a week into it. I thought I was done with the cancellation but three weeks later I receive a charge on my account. I emailed them to tell them that I wanted a refund. I received a reply that stated they would not be able to give me a refund as I did not cancel within the trial period date and in the email offered me the 6 month access free of charge that they do to everyone they won't be giving a refund to. So, I replied and stated that I HAD cancelled weeks before and so I was adamant about the refund and asked if there was anything they could do about it, and if not I would be seeing my bank to help resolve this. No reply after 2 days so I sent another email and again no reply. And now I'm receiving emails saying 'I'm late for my class' which I haven't received since I cancelled weeks ago. I really don't like businesses that operate like this and make their money off of these 'trials'. Would not consider them in the future again and looks like I will have to resolve this with my bank.

Shaw Academy scammed my friend *** for 80 EUR.
Support has not answered her first email about cancellation and provided no initial help.
Dear Revdex.com,

I am contacting you to report a case of fraudulence about Shaw Academy (SA) what my friend *** has fallen victim to.
As she has basic English she asked for my help to have it resolved.
As we have reached no agreement with them, I would like your kind help with this case to get our claims through.
As both *** and I tried to discuss this with them, but they purposefully ignored the facts and our request, we are done negotiating with them and are ready to escalate this case.

Please find the details below:
1. *** had bought a camera and lens kit online at Camera Centre Ireland.
2. She received a leaflet on the inside about a 4 weeks free course at Shaw Academy.
3. XXXX-XX-XX - As it was coming from a trustworthy source she registered.
4. For the registration they required her credit card details.
5. XXXX-XX-XX - She took the first free class.
5. XXXX-XX-XX - After the first class, SA charged her card for 29,99 EUR.
6. XXXX-XX-XX - She has contacted SA support about this and the cancellation straight away without success.
7. The support stayed completely inactive and unresponsive and she received no help.
8. As she has tried to reach out to support about this and cancellation and received no answer, she ran out of time.
9. XXXX-XX-XX - SA charged her card for another 49,99 EUR.
10. XXXX-XX-XX - She has contacted SA support again about this, but the support did not want to understand what is going on.
11. The SA support told her that she clicked on some "Buy Now" button what she definitely did not click on.
12. They have referred to their company policy and did not accept that it was their fault that (we) got to this stage.
13. *** informed SA support of that she would like to get her 80 EUR back what she was charged for in error.
14. SA support did not do anything to understand the case but started spamming her with these compensations about various values.
15. XXXX-XX-XX - As *** could not reach agreement with SA I joined in to help her in this case of fraudulence.
16. XXXX-XX-XX - Later on they even contacted her via phone and a person jabbered something quickly to her what she did not understand so she has asked for email conversation instead.
17. SA then reached out to us of the activation of some other meaningless free compensations on her account "as it was discussed during their phone call". They did not discuss anything as *** did not understand and has not agreed on anything. SA just tried to force something on her again.

*** has received absolutely no invoices, receipts or confirmation mails or any kind of traces from SA about any of these transactions.

I have also contacted SA in hope of getting through this professionally, but they made no attempt to understand our point of view.
They in fact kept bombarding us mindlessly with their compensations instead, even I as a person never registered with them got one activated for my account (?).
This proves that they have not even read or tried to understand what is our issue here or even that on behalf of whom I am reaching out to them.

I have also calculated the total sum of these compensations they have offered during these months, find it below:
399 + 699 + 399 + 199 + 499 USD = 2195 USD
The majority of this came from automatic replies as they were not even taking the time of putting a real person there to discuss our case.

All in all, we gave them a standard 15 working days deadline (XXXX-XX-XX - XXXX-XX-XX) for all this.

As they were did not want to understand anything and handled our matter in a totally unprofessional way, this case caused quite a few restless nights and high amounts of stress for both of us. In addition to her stolen 80 EUR we would like to ask for all their constantly offered compensations (2195 USD in total) as well to be transferred to ***'s account immediately.

All proofs are available on request.

I signed up for a free trial at the onset of covid-19. I am not able to continue due health and money reasons. They charged me & refuse to refund
I signed up for a free trial at the onset of covid19. Due to financial/family reasons I am unable to continue past the trial. I missed the cutoff to cancel by 2 days and they refuse to refund me, even though I am not able to the service at this time. I have emailed 10 times with no response. There is no phone number listed to call.

I tried to cancel a free trial with a system that does not work. I was then charged for a random amount with no description of what the charge was.
I signed up for a free trial and after one use tried to cancel. The cancellation process does not work. After making multiple attempts to cancel they still charged me and will not refund me. I have tried to reach out to their customer service which apparently is nonexistent and instead of a refund I have received multiple offers of a longer subscription which I have made very clear I do not want.

They refused to issue me my refund even after I verbally canceled with them over the phone.
I signed up to try out the Shaw academy free trial. I took one week of classes and decided it was too much on my plate with my other priorities. I paused the subscription on my account. The next day I received a call following up and I told them I needed to cancel as I had too much going on to dedicate my attention to the classes. They told me okay and no problem. Then recently I noticed that I was charged $69.99. I emailed customer service as this was obviosly a mistake and they advised that they will not refund me. I was very confused as I am very sure that I requested verbally they cancel my subscription as I didnt have the time.

Trial subscription was not cancelled despite my attempts to do so, and despite written request for cancellation prior to expiration.
I signed up for a trial class that expired on July 5th. On July 3rd, I attempted to use the website's cancellation option to cancel, but that option doesn't work. They required a phone call. I called, but their offices were closed for the day. So I sent an email to a valid email address with the request for cancellation instead. They didn't respond until the 7th, and advised that account would be cancelled for the next installment. Subsequently they informed me that they do not recognize reasonable attempts to cancel the subscription. It appears that despite being an online entity, a subscriber must call and speak to someone doing their business hours. Those canceling during the week after they are closed, are out of luck and must continue with a subscription. I feel that by providing a cancellation option on their website that doesn't work, they are deceiving subscribers who believe they can easily cancel a trial. Since I requested cancellation, they have been continuously offering me credit for future classes, even after I clearly stated that I requested cancellation of the trial not due to financial reasons but due to a lack of time. I believe they are attempting to trap subscribers by making it more difficult to cancel a subscription. Basically, if they are not available, a subscriber of an online class, cannot cancel despite ANY reasonable attempts to do so.

I have cancelled my subscription, and still I was charged. I would like to request a refund, and the company hasn't been answering my emails.
Hello,

I have cancelled my free trial subscription, as I haven't been using it at all, and still I was charged by Shaw Academy. When I requested refund they said that was never cancelled, which is not true.

The cancellation after a trial is not at all simple and obvious, not user friendly. You can not cancel just online, you call a number they provide and after the cancellation via number you think that should be okay and done now, but not. Apparently, you also need to receive a confirmation email, which is not mentioned, so when you feel after 2 steps, online and phone you are good with cancelling, you are actually not.

When requested refund, they just ignored me and keep offering me to buy more...I emailed several times but seems that they are postponing it and trying to avoid me...

Problem Date: 01.07
Charged on: 29TH June/ 49,99 EUR
Ticket: (#XXXXXXX)
Sales Rep: Anna (Shaw Academy)
Payment method: from my VISA Card/direct debit

I would really appreciate if you could help me with this issue.
Thanks a lot.
Br

I was charged for a service that I never wanted, they made their website hard to navigate which made many customers accidentally buy product.
I signed up to the Shaw Academy's one month free trial on July X XXXX, and during a class on July 7, 2020 I accidentally clicked on a button for one-click purchase of the E-Certificate. The charge was taken from PayPal and I was charged $45.99 CAD. I have expressed to Shaw that I never wanted this product and it is no value to me. Yet, they said that once they have activated a service, they cannot revoke it. I started researching about Shaw and realized that they are a fraudulent company, as many other individuals have been charged for items that they never wanted and charged for a membership they have cancelled months ago. My student number with Shaw is XXXXX. I am also extremely worried as I am unable to cancel my membership with Shaw. On their web page, they have multiple barriers to cancelling the membership and in the last page, they provide a phone number and my student number, instructing me to call the number for cancellation. When I called the number, it was received by a phone bot that never confirmed my identity and after many barriers again, they said I have cancelled my membership. However, when I went back to Shaw, I am still able to log-in, which means that they have been lying about the cancellation. I need help to get a refund from Shaw as many others and myself have been scammed by this fraudulent company. There are also articles on BBC: https://www.bbc.com/news/business-XXXXXXXX , and The Guardian: https://www.theguardian.com/education/2020/jun/13/big-online-learning-provider-f...⇄ . And these articles are only just the tips of the iceberg. I have tried many routes to get a refund, ranging from contacting their CEO on LinkedIn, emailing many of their email addresses, and opening a dispute on PayPal.

Signed up for a free trial but got charged for it anyways even after cancelling my subscription long before the deadline.
I signed on to the free trial on June 3, 2020 for a Graphic Design course but finding the course not very user friendly, stopped my classes and cancelled my subscription through my Apple Account a week into the trial. Shaw Academy charged me regardless for a premium subscription Of $69.99 on my MasterCard set up through my Apple Account on July 2, 2020. After numerous emails corresponding with Anna, Shaw Academy has refused to give me a refund because there were apparently 2 accounts with my email address and only one was cancelled. The emails in question is ***@gmail.com and ***@gmail.com2. According to Shaw the second email .com2 (invalid) address was the first one registered and received the free trial which was cancelled. The valid .com email was registered after and was not cancelled so it was charged. Not sure how you can validate charging an invalid email address for a subscription on an valid Apple Account when the valid subscription was cancelled? I've contacted the company numerous times via email and they're justification is they can't issue a refund due to their terms of the trial period, but gave me free access to the whole course for 6 months. I don't want the course I want my money back. I requested to speak to someone over the phone and was told via email that they do not offer a phone option for contact. Thinking back on the situation I recall having to reset my password *** my account when I was asked to verify my account. I found it odd that I had to reset a password saved when setting up the account because it came up as invalid. I was not given any account/student number.

Shaw Academy will not refund
on 7/09/2020 Shaw Academy took from 69.99 USD from my account before my free trial was over. I never authorized this charge. Shaw Academy also informed my that they would notify me before they charged my account to give me a chance to cancel. They never did. When I tried to get refund they asked for a copy of my bank statements. I'm not sure why they would need that. I would like my refund.

I entered a free trail, but the business has changed me twice at $59.99AUD each time with any authorisation from myself.
I signed up with Shaw Academy on 6th of July for 4-month "free trial". I remember so clearly that after I logged in the website for the first time, there were so many advertisements popping out regarding the toolkits as well as the e-certificates.

Just like what a normal human being would usually do, I clicked on a button to see what toolkit contained. I then realised that this click costed me $59.99AUD without me knowing what I was purchasing for! This is literally a fraudulent advertising with information imbalance or asymmetry to all the customers. I believe it is by definition what an authorised transation is called.

Surprisingly, on the 8th of July, another $59.99AUD was automatically deducted from my card, without me even having a clue on what had I purchased.

I truly feel this is unfair. It is not what a legit business does to the customers.

I contacted they on the 9th of July for the last time asking for refund, but they refused to do so.

Therefore, I have already contacted my bank to file a disputing transaction investigation towards these two unauthorised transactions and the bank has to cancel and replace my debit card to do so. I lost my time and my card on this issue created by Shaw Company.

I have not received my refund yet, so I am here not only asking for a legit refund but also asking for the business stop taking students money in an unauthorised manner. Besides, I find the company's website is misleading and full of deceptive buttons. Especially those "one click purchase" buttons should be removed.