Sales and Marketing
Before I start I am obliged to say that I work in sales and marketing for Bournemouth Commercial Flight Training Centre (BCFT)
It is interesting to read of the frustrations of students and prospective students alike. I felt the same when I was undergoing my training and empathise with those of you going through this.
In defence of the price rises there are a few points which may have led to these. I speak from my own experience here and this may not be the case for Oxford. With the events of the past 12 months, as you can imagine the industry has had to make some changes. Insurance has risen somewhere in the region of 24%, fuel and oil prices have increased (and if the tension in the middle east continues to escalate these are likely to rise further) also increased security measures, all add to the overheads of the company.
As for the high price of integrated courses, the paperwork involved in setting up and maintaining integrated courses comes at a high price to the company. This is why full time modular courses are becoming increasingly popular.
You should always take a magnifying glass to any paperwork you are shown. The small print can sometimes be very very small. To avoid any extra costs at a later date check that VAT, Fuel and ALL Approach and Landing fees are included. on a more surreptitious cost addition, check to see how many students are scheduled per instructor and per aircraft, also if you are mostly with the same instructor or if policy is to change each flight. These are things which can and do add to the cost and reduce the quality of the instruction received. At the end of the day a good name on your cv means nothing if you went hugely over on your training hours and failed each flight test/ground exam numerous times!
I take great pride in the work I do and enjoy meeting and talking to people who are interested in aviation, in all its shapes and forms. I base the way in which I conduct my work on the example which was shown to me by the company I conducted my training with, and try to provide the opposite! (naming no names). Unfortunately a lot of people do not take the same pride in their work as it is 'just a job'.
Every call, e-mail or visitor is important and if a company loses sight of this fact it is then that threads/gossip/rumours like this one begin.
It takes decades to build a good reputation in this world and only a few moments to destroy it.