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Avoid Heart Shaped Box for Tutoring. He's a fraud and a thief.
Earlier this week I sent this email to Juliet (from student services). If you want to discuss further or are interested in seeing the texting thread (which I didn't add to this message) let me know.
Juliet,
I don't know his last name but his first is Di. His alias on 7Sage is "Heart Shaped Box". Regarding specifics, I reached out to him through the comment section in early January. We setup a payment schedule through Venmo $150 for 4 sessions. On about January 27 we had just completed the 1st of our second set of 4 sessions, so I had a balance and 3 more sessions remaining. As we all know the pandemic was in it's very early stages and my wife is an anesthesiologist in the Boston area. The significance of this is she got sick early Feb, and we have a 2 very small children. My focus shifted away from studying at the time as I needed to take care of our household, and as we all know all hell broke loose very shortly thereafter. I did not communicate with Di (since that last session in late January) until 2 days ago. Following is the text thread of my attempt to reach out to Di and ask for the remaining balance to be refunded. Nothing has been added or subtracted. I have not since contacted him nor has he contacted me.
As I hope you can see/tell, he is refusing to return any of my money because I "disappeared" etc. There was never any discussion of these stringent terms on top of the fact that the circumstances (a worldwide viral pandemic of which my wife works the front line) were far from the norm or what ANYONE could have predicted. If he simply decided to not be so immediately confrontational and talk to me we probably could have figured something out that worked for us both. He never attempted to seek out any understanding of my situation and predicament. Like I said a couple of times in the thread I was so disappointed. I thought we had at least a professional ability to communicate. We actually had a friendly rapport. I really did not expect that sense of hostility that he conveyed. I was totally taken aback and I think any other potential student should know what happened.
Again, I appreciate your help!
Rich
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I'm sorry you feel this way Rich. Like I said, we planned the session the following week and I had put in the time and effort to prep the sessions but you didn't show up nor gave me any heads up or contact. Like I said, you literally disappeared and that was at a time the pandemic was not really part of the conversation.
I most certainly would have issued the refund had I sensed even a hint of pandemic being the reason or had you contacted me in anyway the entire time. Instead, I was blamed for not reaching out to you a few days ago in texts when you're the one no-shows and subsequently disappears; it has always been difficult to reach you.
Many tutors I know have no refund policy on cancellation within a certain time frame ranging from 24 to 72 hours and you disappeared for over 2 months, literally. Even the times you were in communication, I had to constantly text you track you down in order to confirm our next session and often times you won't text back until hours later and then would reschedule. I have tutored many students and none of them has any issues on the quality of lessons, especially on pricing as I have the lowest rate and on top of that often give them (including you) significant extra time per session and they all show up as scheduled, or, if things may get in the way, they all have the courtesy to give a notice. No one just not show up after we put in the time to prep the lessons and then ghosts their tutor for over 2 months. Even if for pandemic, which, it didn't seem to be the case since you have mentioned no such a thing during our last session months ago, you still could have given me a notice as simple as a text message and I would have mostly likely issued a refund at the time. But unfortunately that's not what happened.
On the "hostility" note, I'm not sure I was the one conveying it as I wrote you the same tone over text messages couple of days ago (have them as proof) and you immediately responded with "this is bullshit, Di..." and then threatened me with negative review if I don't issue the refund.
If "fraud and thief" is the way I operate, I'm fairly certain you would have seen many complaint posts like this. But you seem to be the only one and there seems to be a reason for it.
I wish you well, Rich.
I have no connection to what happened between Di and the above 7Sager but I just wanted to bring some potential balance to this post. Di has tutored me several times over the course of my 7Sage studies and has always been very helpful and generous with his time. He's a great tutor and his prices are excellent. Many times our sessions have lasted longer than the allotted time that I paid for and he has given me discounts or written off entirely the charges for the extra time spent. I've never had to cancel a session with Di but I have had to reschedule and he's been very fair and flexible in my experience.
I want to offer my opinion regarding user, “heart shaped box.” I consider Di a very helpful and valuable member of this community. He has posted hundreds, if not thousands of explanations and replies to comments in the core curriculum and individual questions. Obviously, Di is dedicated and committed to the LSAT prep community and I appreciate his perspective and his time very much. I think using words such as “fraud and thief” is libelous and untrue. I don’t think those accusations even fit the circumstances noted above. And clearly Di does a lot of free work helping students. Please rethink your emotional comments before posting publicly. Its opportunist to blame Covid19 for everything.
I’m shocked to read this because that is not the Heart Shaped Box I know. I tutored with him for four months. I have to say that he is the best tutor I have ever had, and this is coming from someone who had had tutors from 7Sage and other prep companies. He is always prepared and incredibly generous with his time. He would ask me to send him questions that troubled me before every session, so he can make problem sets for me, which often included other similar questions so we can really drill on the pattern. He has never charged the times we spent reviewing homework, nor has he stopped tutoring simply because our allotted time was up, which has not been the case with my other tutors. In fact, he would often say “you know I’m not going to charge you for this. Take your time. You should really understand this pattern because I guarantee you that it’s going to repeat”. Heart Shaped Box also charges at such an economical rate for his superb tutoring skills, something that is truly rare in the LSAT world. I have never had to cancel a session with him, but he has always been flexible when I had to reschedule.
Di is my current LSAT tutor. I would absolutely hire him again. He is able to relate to me as LSAT student who is struggling to get ahead. He is soooo patient and understanding. Any student he works with HIM will know. I personally seen in improvement in my score! .
I also have no connection between the user and heart shaped box, but I wanted to offer my own opinion. After going through various tutors, it was extremely nice to have someone as genuine as him. Di is a dedicated individual and is committed to ensuring that his students have a solid foundation and works with them.He takes his time to explain everything from A to Z, without making that person feel small. From our sessions alone, I have more confidence studying for the LSAT. I work a full time job and he has a flexible schedule. I appreciate him being my tutor.
To offer a perspective from another tutor:
If no effort was made to reschedule or cancel sessions--to make any contact whatsoever--until months later, charges of fraud and theft are wildly inappropriate.
As someone who relies on income from tutoring to pay my bills, I can make confident assurances that income from January is long gone by April. Preparations for a tutoring session can often take longer than the session itself. Even when prep is minimal though, we still clear our schedules, show up, and wait when students don't inform us they're not coming. Not offering a refund in this situation is far from a "stringent" policy and nowhere near "fraud and theft." It's overwhelmingly reasonable, and it's a pretty standard policy for service providers of many kinds. If you hire a catering company to cater a wedding reception and then cancel the reception without telling the caterer, you are not entitled to a refund.
Of course, given the circumstances, the reason for not showing up is legitimate. I would refund even a last minute cancellation given the circumstances. Though I'd feel no obligation to, I'd even refund a no-show if I was given an explanation later that day or probably even at some point over the next few days. At a certain point though, the grace period runs out.
It would be libel in this case not slander...
It sounds like you need to learn to be respectful of other people's time, my friend.
I PMd the user for the texts he mentioned because I wanted to see them before I commented. I just read them and in my opinion Di is in no way hostile in his response and is quite professional. No insults or swear words on Di’s part. Heart shaped box is probably the most active sage in the 7sage comment section. He has replied to many other students who’ve been confused and needed help. Not showing up to sessions and not saying a word for 2 months is really unfair to him. So to say he is a “thief” and a “fraud” is outlandish. You’re questioning his integrity and intentionally attempting to hurt his reputation so he loses potential students. This is just spiteful.
I don't know either of you and am therefore not particularly invested in the outcome, but I've been doing this for almost a decade now and have been on the receiving end of this enough to say that the opportunity cost of setting up a lesson time and the wasted prep work alone justify the lack of refund here.
When a student no-shows, I have to prep the lesson, incur an opportunity cost by giving you a time slot (meaning that not only can I not give that slot to someone else, but I also have to bend the rest of my life around that appointment), and then show up anyway and wait it out even if you never show. I then have to figure out what happened and what the student wants to do about it. I don't get my time back for any of that. Late cancels are already a pain in the ass, but no-shows are a whole other level, to say nothing of the ghosting. I'm not your mother, so if you can't be bothered to take care of your own affairs, I'm not going to chase after you. Giving a refund here would be an act of extremely good faith, but I don't think it should be expected by any means.
If you'd done this to me, I'd personally have billed you 1 hour for the first lesson, 1 hour for the second lesson (the fact that you missed it is irrelevant, I had to prep it and be there), 1 hour penalty for no-showing it, and 1 hour of time spent trying and failing to track you down over the course of two months to ascertain what happened. This is the entire reason you get people to pay in advance. Can you imagine what Di would have had to do to get payment from this guy if he hadn't paid in advance?
It's 2020. Sending a text or an email takes 30 seconds, tops. There is no excuse.
On the tutor side, this is why you must draw up clear guidelines about what happens when this happens. As with anything legal, you don't write it for the 99% of cases where it doesn't matter; you write it for the 1% of cases where it does.
Given the circumstances, I can understand where the Original Poster is coming from. We should show some empathy in circumstances like this, while he may not be in the right and Heart Shaped Box has every right to not give him his money back, the OP has some legitimate excuses. Wife who presumably works on the front lines got sick while COVID was starting and he has two young kids. I can't imagine being a father in times like this with a wife who works on the front lines suddenly becoming ill and having to worry about my children.
The last thing on my mind would be the LSAT. OP may not have been right, but in my opinion and given the circumstances; I think many tutors out there would have refunded him the amount less the one session given. Compare this to air line, hotels, booking companies having to refund people back there money even though they have strict policies in place that do not require them by law to refund people back there money (if you were like me and had summer plans and booked a non-refundable ticket/reservation, you likely got it back in the form of a voucher or full refund). Most businesses are doing it because it is the right thing to do. But to each their own I guess.
And is all this really worth the $100 and change to deal with?
You two please have some communication. And 7Sage please step up and do some mediation.
lmfao how does this have so many likes.
Your analogy to the multi billion dollar travel industry is ludicrous. Remote tutoring doesn't expose one to covid. The individual tutor is not worth millions of dollars and can't rely on a big bailout. Most of the companies offering cancellations require some notice, which the OP did not give. And, you completely ignored the time frame in question.
$100 isn't much, but I hope the tutor does't refund it. OP seems like a serial Karen that complains until he gets his way. Refunding him would reward his tantrum.
🤣 serial Karen check
I actually think the analogy is more than fair. OP and his tutor did not have a contractual agreement in place, while in my analogy the many people who enter into a contractual agreement with companies enter into one with non-refundable air fare, hotel bookings, and car rentals. These companies did not have to offer a full refund or voucher, but they have done so because it is the right thing to do.
Also, since OP and his tutor didn't enter into a written agreement on the specifics on how the money was to be allocated. It can be argued that Heart Shaped Box did not provide a service and therefore is questionably withholding OP's money for services yet to be rendered.
While I agree with the sentiment behind, I feel like @LSAT160's comment/analogy is made based on a presumption - that the pandemic was in fact the cause of his non-communication before and disappearance after. The thing is you don't know what actually happened, and I don't either. But based on the first hand personal interaction, I have doubts and reasonable ones.
It's been a repetitive pattern throughout the time long before the pandemic; we had 3 sessions total and 2 of which had be to rescheduled and none of the times I was given a notice beforehand. I had to be the one to reach out and find out he can't make it every time after having to clear my schedule and planning the lessons, and that's not a behavior exhibited from anyone I have tutored.
I do not anticipate to have this turn into a back and forth drama, you've made your case and I didn't say anything so I'd appreciate it if we could drop it now.
Okay my heat sank when I saw the title of the discussion thread because I recognize that username from his explanations throughout CC. @"Heart Shaped Box" I didn't know you were offering tutoring services!!!!!
Reading this thread actually assured me that you are a fair, cool-headed, and patient tutor and I really want to work with you during my last stretch before my June/July LSAT. Will you be able to offer any more tutoring services (even just once a week) at this time? I'd highly appreciate it!
@keepcalmandneuron Yes I am, and I'll pm you
While I have not used the tutoring services of Heart shaped Box, I was truly shocked to see this post. I specifically remember seeing many many posts written by Heartshaped Box throughout 7Sage forums and on specifc questions and he has always seemed genuine with the true desire to help people.
I am sorry to hear that the OP's plans changed, that his wife became ill and I know first hand how hard it is to be the person in charge of a young child and household. I am single Mom with a 5 year who is working full time, studying etct. so I understand being busy and overwhelmed.
BUT there is not an excuse to not be able to send a text message or an email or a phone call for 2 months. The choice of language in the title is really unfounded. I hope the OP will really think about these accusations and own his part in this as well. Maybe then you guys can have a reasonable conversation and come to an agreement on a partial refund.
I would also understand no refund being offered as well. $150 for 4 sessions from a well regarded tutor is very reasonable. Look around, because I see tutors ranging from $100 to over $400 per hour. As others have commented, yes I am sure there wasn't a contract, BUT we all need to take a step back and remember what the 7Sage reccomended tutors are offering us- which is help from a current or former student for a very reasonable price. When you get to the point where you are having to set things up as a "business" rather than students helping students you will see prices dramtically increase as well as much stricter policies regarding no shows/ cancellations/ running over time ect. 7 Sage has an amazing community and I really hope we won't lose the students helping other students idea because of things like this.
I really thought this post was a troll at first. I studied with Di for months leading up to my past January LSAT and I've got nothing but respect for him. He's one of the most amazing individuals I've ever met. He is not only a fantastic tutor but a great friend and mentor. His personal story is inspiring and you guys should ask him for details if you got a chance to tutor with him lol. Like many of you said, Di had offered tons of extra times that he could have billed for. He had also called me in every stage of my LSAT studying and offered me many valuable advices. I am sorry for what you have gone through Rich, but this does not change the fact that Di is an amazing tutor and a man of integrity.
This is irrelevant but I just want to say that you sound like a superhero!! I'm not sure if I'd be able to do all this on top of working full time AND being a single parent of a young child. You go girl.