London
New information has come to light in the Precision Training saga. Besides the basic scam of taking money from students and employers in the guise of giving training for NVQ's and not supplying, the heads of Precision added insult to injury with another little way of getting money out of hapless foreign students - the cost of travel when they entered the UK was overpriced.
What happened in the case of seven students was extortionate in the extreme. The students were met at Gatwick airport by a Precision Training staffer. They were first of all transported to an industrial estate in Birmingham, which was Precision's Birmingham HQ, a distance of just less than 200kms (124 miles) using the M25 orbital motorway around London rather than travelling through the capital.For this they were charged £100 each, a total of £700.
When they were at the building in the industrial estate they were given folders, supposedly all the course work outlines, then taken by mini-bus to Birmingham's New Street station. For this they were charged an additional £5 each, there were now 9 in the mini-bus, so that was £45 for a 9km journey.
At the station, the students were basically told get your own tickets to your final destination, and off you go.
The charge of £100 each from Gatwick to Birmingham was a good way of earning a bonus for Precision. Especially as there were seven students so totalling £700. A check with taxi companies at Gatwick airport showed a car carrying 4 passengers would be charged at £189, with a people's carrier for seven people costing £300.
Of course. as all the students were new to the country, they would have had no idea of relative costs so were easy prey for the picking.
Posted at: 03:59 | Add Comment
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