D has decided to go to a different school after we made an early deposit to make sure she had a spot. We have called, written, emailed and gotten ZERO response on getting a refund. It is $300 so not cheap. It clearly states in all the literature that the deposit IS refundable prior to May 1. Has anyone successfully gotten a deposit back?
To be honest, this school was pretty bad at responding AT ALL when we had other questions that were important to acceptance decisions and scholarship money terms. Any advice?
HVe you called admissions and talked to someone other than the person who answers the phone?
You need to call, and ask to speak to the person who handles refunds. Sometime the folks answering the phones can’t even come close to answering your questions.
@thumper1 I definitely have not – both D and I have had zero success with calls for any reason to the school. We keep getting ‘someone who answers the phones’ telling us they will take a message (not just for this particular item) and yet we never ever get a call back. Honestly it didn’t leave me feeling good about the school at all.
I should probably try again after school is back in session in January.
OP, I agree that the implication of that language is that the deposit is refundable.
I guess the best you can do is just keep calling every day. I’d ask for the name and number of the call-taker’s boss, and then bug them, and so on. Good luck! I’d be super-annoyed.
Some schools are really bad at refunds. My daughter didn’t get her housing security deposit back until 4 or 5 weeks into junior year, after she ‘applied’ to have it refunded.
I suspect you are contacting the admissions office, and they have to send a request to the finance office and no one is in a hurry to process it. They may not process them until May 1
@twoinanddone yeah I was wondering that – a response would be nice! On a side note, I had to pay her HS an activity fee of $200 - she was then cut from the varsity sports team and so is owed a refund which they said I could get AFTER graduation gah.
I really hate the business office at D#2’s school. They make everything very complicated. An older student reminded my daughter to apply for her security deposit, which had to be done in the office, so even though she moved out in May of sophomore year, she didn’t get the money until Oct or so. They processed it after the bill was due (in August), so then the refund was a credit on her bill, which required a process to get those funds to her during the semester. I watch the billing very carefully.
My other daughter is at a school where the refunds happen almost instantly. Last year they ‘refunded’ all her student aid in mid-January (semester didn’t start until the 25th) because she was going on semester abroad and that bill was due on Jan 15. She moved out of her dorm in May of freshman year and deposit was refunded by the first week of June.
It can be done if the school wants to do it fast. Some just don’t want to.
STILL nothing – I called, I got a name, I emailed to the name. Nothing… I called direct line of the name, no answer so I left a message. STILL nothing.
Finally I emailed the chief of staff in the President’s office, he emailed back that he would contact name. GAH!!!
I will send a registered letter if this avenue doesn’t get me anywhere.,
Can’t tell if this is a small school that’s understaffed or a large school that doesn’t care. Good luck though. I would be sure to send that registered letter way before the non-refundable date. One trick if the chief of staff route doesn’t work, is to keep adding people (within reason) to the email each time you’re ignored “just to keep them informed, wink wink.”
I did get a call last night (7:30 pm) telling me she (the admissions person responsible) apologizes because she thought it was taken care of and she promised to follow through and have it processed so we will see!
