City Trading & Investment. CTI My oppinion CTI provide a very poor service and misleading trainees. London Canary Wharf

I want report a company named City Trading & Investment. My opinion I received poor service and absolutely misleading information on their website and the PDF files they sent to introduce me to the program I signed up for, their Three Month Trading & Portfolio Management course in the prestigious Canary Wharf location, for which I paid £2700.

The brochures show that from week nine, trainees will be provided with company funds and could experience commission based live trading, with those that complete the course with a flat or better live account being offered a job with CTI. This is the main reason I signed, and I believe why most people would want to sign in with CTI.  The schedule tells you that you will have lots of seminars and lectures at set times, which gives you a big confidence actually receiving physical teaching in a structured manner, finishing your programme in 3 months and successfully getting your certificate in Trading & Portfolio Management.

My experience started badly, contacting CTI by the phone number provided and getting a response that someone will get back to me asap. It took me a week of call backs before I must emailed and finally getting an email back from “Head of Trading” in CTI. He told me that all the information will be sent to me by the end of the day on the courses they provide, it took another 5 days of chasing. I read the PDF emailed to me with programme information and paid the required money. Arriving early on the first day I was expecting to be picked up from the lobby on time, rather than 30 min late after chasing with the receptionist.

I was taken to a small room which has no windows, where all of the trainees spent the entire course. Staying in there from 9:00 to 18:00 was very uncomfortable, where 8 to 10 people were not allowed to open a door for fresh air.

The first week was started, we was told teaching will be done via hotcomm (instant messaging chatroom) and if there is a difficulties then you could ask their Analyst (“Personal Mentor”) to come in to the room to help. Sometimes it took 5 min, other times took hours if not days to get questions answered.

Our concern about not having a physical teaching was explained that first few weeks we must get familiar with the generic, free, trading software. We have had an interview with Head of Trading and I never saw him again. The “course” was really material provided via emails and report requests. I tried to chase CTI for days to provide me with materials as I heard from others that they already have it. They just told me that everyone is on the different timing and Head of Trading will be emailing me. I have received few emails.

Daily we was supplied with latest financial market reports and had to do trading on our own using fundamentals. The course was to include trading S&P mini 500 and Euro/USD, though it was not clear they meant only Futures.

I left during week 8, the live account being available only if your “demo” account was positive for 4 weeks, which then changed to being positive each week for 4 weeks. Interestingly they asked us to turn off demo mode on the week 4 . I was told I will be given additional time free of charge, as was everyone else on the course, as no-one who started with me had achieved the “required level”. There was also a whole week when we was not receiving any “teaching” as the CTI Analyse was out for holiday but the general manager was popping in daily for short chat on how we doing. Any question on what was next on Trading & Portfolio Management, we was told the Head of Trade will follow up with us, we were waiting for another week to see him, and then told that he is delaying his visit for another week. This is when I said enough is enough. Absolutely ridiculous, after losing 2 month of my time already and being behind to my opinion with an unprofessional service, I could not stay longer to be able to get what I was promised.

I told CTI my concerns and asked them refund my money as I have no intention waste more of my time with such a service. My complaint was taken and followed up with email stating that there is no refund of my money, I was not even offered for the remaining 4 weeks of the course, as I terminated “voluntarily”.

CTI not registered with FCA I found that out later, which is not very professional to my oppinion.. I have lost not just money I have paid but most importantly my time! My opinion they just created impossible for trainees to succeed, why would they do that still left an open question!