Complaints

The complaint text that is displayed might not represent all complaints filed with BBB. Some consumers may elect to not publish the details of their complaints, some complaints may not meet BBB's standards for publication, or BBB may display a portion of complaints when a high volume is received for a particular business.

• Initial Complaint

  Date:03/28/2024

  Type:Sales and Advertising Issues
  Status:

  AnsweredMore info

  Complaint statuses

  Resolved:

  The complainant verified the issue was resolved to their satisfaction.

  Unresolved:

  The business responded to the dispute but failed to make a good faith effort to resolve it.

  Answered:

  The business addressed the issues within the complaint, but the consumer either a) did not accept the response, OR b) did not notify BBB as to their satisfaction.

  Unanswered:

  The business failed to respond to the dispute.

  Unpursuable:

  BBB is unable to locate the business.

  Services offered have not been implemented. Request for a refund have been ignored. Company admitted in the owners' words "I understand that you have had some bad experiences and even your experience with Community Educational Funding didn't get off to the best start" I agreed with this owner, ***********************, Quote: "First let me just say that this definitely has not been a particularly good experience as you pointed out, for the amount of money invested."*********************** understood the issues and admitted as much by saying it didn't get off to a good start. We just want to move on and get our money back. Simple.

  Business Response

  Date: 04/19/2024

  ********* complaint is baseless. This has all started due to a now former disgruntled employee who is personal friends with ************, it is our belief that they are coordinating this together to try to cause harm and seek some form of revenge for terminating  the employment . We have provided ************ everything promised in his contract with our company. We have documentation of pages of contacts and information working with the student and the family. Here is what we guarantee, we guarantee that we will save families thousands of dollars in paying for college in multiple ways, this can be thru grants, scholarships, academic aid, financial aid and leveraging strategies on existing funds. What we dont promise is that every school will give a family money, or that their student can get into every school, which is why we use college roadmap to give options to families who want to take advantage of the free money that becomes available. It then boils down to choice. ************, has been shown multiple ways to access free money, but refuses to provide the letters of acceptance for the schools she has been accepted to. It is my belief that he has been working with my former employee to cause issues due to the fact the former employee was let go.
  
  We made a good faith offer to Mr. ********** on April 11,2024 that he rejected. We offered to provide a scholarship to his daughter  for the amount of his investment in our program provided that he gave us the documentation we needed to verify the school awards for the schools she was accepted to. We use this information to verify offers and awards that a family is given. You cant ask for money back without providing the information. ************ in email rejected this offer and instructed us not to contact him again unless we were willing to send him a check we are not going to do that. We will however provide the scholarship to his student if he complies with what is needed on his end for us to do that. We maintain and believe that ************ complaint is personally motivated and he is truly trying to extort my company. Let me know if you have any questions. We trust this puts this to rest.

  Customer Answer

  Date: 04/19/2024

   
  I am rejecting this response because:

  
  First off: I really dont know how to respond.   This owner is documenting on a public forum (this site) lies about me and has included my name in his response.  Telling lies and stating my name is associated with the lie is unacceptable.  I have emailed this owner previously (April 8, 2024) PLEASE stop with your unprofessional and reckless emails back to me due to his unacceptable emails and now this owner has done the same unprofessional and reckless response with lying about me on this BBB site.  This is TOTAL disregard to my privacy and again unacceptable!   
  
  The fact is this:  I met for lunch with the employee that the owner called former disgruntled employee on June 16, 2023, stating many issues I was having with Community Educational Funding and that I was not happy with the service and that I want my money back.  On July 24, 2023, the owner emailed me with the following statement Lastly, I wanted to make you aware that 'said employee' has gone off in a different direction and is no longer representing Community Educational Funding so if you have questions you will need to direct them to me. 

  
  So, if I am working with his former disgruntled employee, then how could that be if I met with him on June 16, 2023, and requested a refund before he was terminated?   

  Lastly, he asked me and my wife to in his words sign a hold harmless / non-disclosure agreement with Community Educational Funding if we accepted the scholarship offer that was my idea to begin with and not to be taken seriously.  I offered back to the owner that I will sign his hold harmless /non-disclosure if he submits a refund to me. So, he states I turned down (my idea that was not meant to be serious) his good faith scholarship.  This cannot be true when it was not his idea or good faith offer as he said.    I have ****** stated that I want a refund to him and on this BBB site, nothing more, nothing less.  

  
  

  Business Response

  Date: 04/22/2024

  To Whom it may ***************** have a signed contract that we have met the terms of...that being said, I want to address the misinformation that is being disseminated by this person.  The friend who is now former employee contracted was terminated on May 15th, 2023, any meeting that would have taken place would have no validity as the former employee should have notified the complainant that they were no longer contracted with CEF. We only notify clients of employee changes on a need to know basis to protect everyone's privacy. We don't believe that a refund is warranted, however we did offer to fund a scholarship based on trying to maintain good will, this offer has been rejected. The ***** is standard in cases like these so I am unsure why this is an issue...our services has helped many families save thousands on college, we will not be lied about or bullied... we stand for what is right.