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THE IRISH COUNCIL for International Students (ICOS) has said that claims Shelbourne College owes tens of thousands of euro to students need to be “robustly addressed”.
RTÉ has reported that the Dublin college owes €200,000 to more than 50 students in India, Nepal, Vietnam, Pakistan and the Philippines.
Representatives for the students told RTÉ that they have been trying to get the money refunded since June.
Shelbourne College has disputed the €200,000 figure and said it has already reimbursed out-of-pocket students to the tune of €400,000. It blames the current situation on recent financial difficulties.
In a statment released today, ICOS said that the revelations give “a clear illustration of the scope for abuse by unscrupulous colleges under the current policy framework in which students must pay fees to colleges ahead of applying for a visa”.
The Irish student visa system obliges many non-EU citizens who wish to study here to pay fees to approved colleges before they apply for a visa. If their application is rejected, people can find it difficult to get their money refunded.
ICOS Director Sheila Power said that the news should be “a catalyst for much needed reform of current arrangements”.
Although vital advances are already underway to root out some of the underlying issues in the private college sector, student confidence in Ireland has clearly been shaken this year. More progress on quality and tougher enforcement will be key to rebuilding it.
Shelbourne College runs a range of courses, including business, tourism, media and English. TheJournal.ie has unsuccessfully tried to contact the college for comment.
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There is a thing called an advanced payment guarantee that people who work in international trade will be aware of. It occurs where an importer pays a deposit to the exporter to secure an order, the exporter then has to provide a bank guarantee of the amount of the deposit to the importer in the event that the exporter fails to honour the order.
These colleges should be required to provide bank guarantees of the amount of the fees to the students.
Exactly. Or even an escrow account would do.
For sake! Why not prosecute Dublin college for misleading & theft?
Fees must be charge after visa decision for all the international students then there will not be a problem of refunding ever. Different policies and structure is the main hurdle and stable private colleges are monopoly as group to get an advantage of the closure of small colleges. Dealt very badly by immigration and minister of education.
Considering most of the ” students ” of these ” colleges ” spent their time working not studying
Its no harm they were closed , surely the people who used them knew there was something funny when most of the students were not attending and yet were marked as present , meanwhile our own students could not find a part time job because of all these scammers
OMG whats going on there? I paid 4000 Euro to the Shelbourne College and waiting for the visa from last ten weeks… I don’t know how ill get my money back… but this is the responsibility of the Organization who issue the license for international student”s to college. They make sure to refund money of students. And please any suggestion from any one then don’t hesitate to contact.
Its big international education scam, typical english country cheating to asia students….very bad and smart peoples
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