Kaplan Crisis

zhulme

I have been constantly phoning Kaplan over the past 4 weeks to get my last skills test results asap. i understand that theres a backlog due to the deadline for the skills test however this is really hindering my progress for the final year as i started studying 2 months ago. I called today after being told my results would be in to be told my paper isnt there and hasnt been even logged into the system despite being told otherwise by earlier correspondence, i know it got there as i sent it tracked but im seriously worried now this is not funny at all.

PGM

Thats pretty bad when you pay the fees they charge!

zhulme

hey

yep it is really and they still have no idea where the paper is!! i spoke to them yesterday regarding it stating that they would get back to me with more information but theyve apparently just sent an email to the assessor and not even chased it up, its pretty poor really considering i very rarely contatc them despite paying for the whole distance learning package. I wont be doing that again i can tell you that for nothing! my blood is slowly boiling!

golftotty

Kaplan

Glad to hear someone else has had problems with Kaplan - it has been a nightmare from the start. I took my spreadsheet exam in Feb and still not had my results!! I have had 2 CBA crashed whilst I have been taking them, turned up for Spreadsheet exam after working on Excel 2007 and they have 2003 on their computers....

Got exam tomorrow and then finished level 3 I hope. Where shall I go for Level 4?

zhulme

kaplan

exactly the same boat as me mate this was the last exam and if i miss the deadline because of their farsical system im wreaking hell upon them!! if you do find any provider that isnt a complete wasnt of time and good luck for the exam tomorrow, im just going to stick with purely buying the books off amazon for level 4 that way i cant go wrong!!

missw

I'm having trouble with Kaplan too, i'm still on Level 2 and have found their communication is awful, thank god AAT send letters/emails otherwise i'd be in big trouble.

Molly76

I thought it was just me being unlucky that Kaplan had lost my Unit 32 assessment I did in January and I had to re-sit it because they could not find it. They said it must had got lost in the Post Office.

zhulme

hi

well they did manage to get my exam but had to send me 2 extra questions which i made an effort to send next day recorded. 6 weeks later they were still telling me they never even sent me the extra questions yet i seem to have the proof of delivery and scanned in copies of what i sent back. i must have spent £25 on phonecalls in the last 3 weeks and not one person has made an effort to update their system to say that they have definately had it or how many times i had been calling to see if it was infact lost and what i was going to do given the dealines and all. However i had a break through this week 1 lady actually decided to go out of her way to look for it turns out that it is still with the assessor and not lost like everyone else at Kaplan has told me. Good news however i am certainly not studying with kaplan and have started the level 4 at home with no provider its really not been worth it at all!

coojee

Molly76 wrote: »

I thought it was just me being unlucky that Kaplan had lost my Unit 32 assessment I did in January and I had to re-sit it because they could not find it. They said it must had got lost in the Post Office.

A word of advice, always return assessment papers by special delivery, I know it costs more but at least you can trace it and claim compensation if it gets lost.

pirate

I sent all of mine except the last one recorded as i couldnt get to a post office.
It was scanned for me though so I have a copy if it got lost could they accept the scanned copy or should you not be making copies

coojee

pirate wrote: »

I sent all of mine except the last one recorded as i couldnt get to a post office.
It was scanned for me though so I have a copy if it got lost could they accept the scanned copy or should you not be making copies

You're not supposed to make copies as they're live assessment material, centres aren't supposed to assess copies.

pirate

Coojee
makes sense as you wouldnt in a live situation. it didnt say anything on the documents so the supervisor scanned it for me so i would have a copy in case they need to ask additional questions to assess me
well lets hope that one arrived the others did as I could track them online will phone later to check they have received them.

missw

Kaplan Crisis

Lucky i have patience and can laugh because on Monday they really showed how lame their customer service is...

1. I turn up 45mins early for my workskills SIM at 2pm, get told to go to particular room
2pm comes, i'm outside room, on my own so i worry i've been told to go to the wrong place.
Instead of going up to customer services again (typically i thought if i go, everyone else will turn up and i'll be late) i decide to phone customer services... on all 3 of their numbers, no answer so i keep ringing all 3 numbers continuously then give up and go up to their office.

2. A different girl on reception than earlier, i explain the above & she tells me my SIM is actually at 5pm!
I tell her who i spoke to and that they def said 2pm. 10 mins of faffing about & the girl on reception realised she was looking at the wrong thing, the 5pm SIM is not for my level.
More waiting around while she finds someone who knows about my 2pm SIM. 2.20pm and i'm stressing because this is my last opportunity as im on the old pathway and im imagining my SIMs taking place somewhere and im missing it

3. 2.30 the girl comes back, i told her i'm only doing unit 31 element 1 as i completed and passed the other 2 elements July'10, and todays SIM is a resit. She tells me if i failed element 1 i need to re-do elements 2 & 3! I tell her i dont and that on the AAT Website it clearly says elements 2 & 3 are complete and only element 1 is outstanding.

4. She comes back with a laptop and papers for element 1 and explains that the tutor who was meant to be invigilating the 2pm SIM is not in today and no-one else knows anything about it so she sets me up in a room with 2 other people (who seemed to be doing the sage element) and finally i think im on my way....

5. I load the laptop and find it strange its blank, the docs i need for element 1 are not on the disk so i go back to customer services, the girl asks me what i need and she phones the tutor who was meant to be invigilating.... more waiting while the tutor tells the girl how to upload the relevant files on the disk...

6. Finally sorted almost an hour later and get on with no more problems..... until i'm finished and need to return to customer services to get them to print out my work. The lady in customer services tries to print from my disk on her computer, one of the docs came up in random characters so she tells me i'll need to redo it. I sarcastically said it's lucky that i wrote all my answers in the answer booklet as well as on the PC so i could just copy it... lucky it doesnt come to that though as she tries another computer. Another half hour while she figures out how to add a printer and finally all sorted.

7. I was told a tutor would contact me in a couple of weeks with my results. After reading the above about things going astray and that i left my work with a customer services lady i worried about mine going missing and having to repeat this whole nightmare so i emailed customer services yesterday asking them to contact me when my results are in (also prompting them that my SIM was left in their hands so hoped it'd be passed on for marking)
Got a reply this morning saying my result would be posted on the AAT website. So i guess a tutor will not contact me like the first lady said.

A lot of people find exams stressful enough you'd expect customer services to at least make it as easy as possible for us? I couldnt believe that all the above happened, literally one thing after another!!! I just hope i've passed and it'll be worth it.
I want to move onto the intermediate level but i'm not sure i want to use kaplan.... maybe it's just the college i use and other branches are more professional?

pirate

OMG Missw
thanks an absolute nightmare I can think of nothing else that could have gone wrong with this sim.
Fingers crossed that they manage to mark it ok and you pass.
do you know what you failed on in the first place, just curious as I sat all of mine 3 weeks ago so if I fail I wont have another chance will have to move to new standards as it takes 4 to 6 weeks for the results which will be end of May.

missw

Hi Pirate, lol i know, it was literally one thing after another. As i managed to do my sim i look back and laugh but at the time i was so stressed, i couldnt believe it!
I failed element 1 the first time round because i didnt revise enough and not on the parts that came up, i underestimated how much work was involved with all 3 elements so it was my own fault really. I know i definately failed on the index numbers part and also i got mixed up with the ROCE, net profit etc formulas. Least this time i knew what was going to be in the test so fingers crossed i get through it this time.
Fingers crossed for you too, hope you've passed the unit, how did you find it, do you feel you did ok?
Paula.

SandyHood

I am most surprised by the content of this thread, and hope Kaplan can reply to reassure readers.

I have met many tutors from Kaplan who are professional and very good indeed.

The issue of submitting simulations by post can be addressed in the way students of mine on degree and HND courses have completed their exams. In the cases I dealt with, I would send the exam paper to the embassy in their home country, the date and time would be fixed, the embassy would invigilate and collect the candidate's answer. The embassy would then arrange for the answer to be sent/couriered to me at college to mark.
Surely, the supervisor of simulations collects completed simulations and sends them to the assessor (recorded delivery), not the person who sits the simulation.

zhulme

sandyhood

youre right about sending the exam papers if it were a normal exam however i know for students who sit the extra questions that have to be supervised. have to send the papers themselves to the main kaplan centre in leeds then again onto the assessor which i think is where the slip ups are coming from. kaplan have apparently found my exam paper now which has been with the assessor now for nearly 6 weeks and i have been told it will be another 2 until i get the answers, if i ever do that is. Im glad i didnt wait for the answers before going onto the final year otherwise id still be sat here twiddling my thumbs! I must say though as regards the responses from kaplan they are very poor ive made appoximately 25 calls to them in the past month (as i thought my paper had been lost) and not one called me back, just seems like a lot of money wasted on extremely poor customer service.

I do hope all your queries are resolved folks seems as though were a large number of highly dissatisfied consumers!