Kaplan University Good classes and instructors, terrible administrative and finance department, misleading ads... Internet

I'm a straight-A student, made the dean's list, excited about going back to school, got a veteran's discount for the bachelors degree program and a third of my credits already accounted for due to prior schooling, so I figured I'm well on my way to a degree. All of a sudden I get an email telling me I've withdrawn from school and owe Kaplan over $1400, and I've got to pay up in less than two weeks. And I have to pay in full.

I owe this money because they made a mistake and took too much from my federal loan and had to give it back, and now I have to pay them back. The federal loan system is very low interest and designed to be paid back over a long period of time because anyone who needs a loan in the first place can't afford to pay lump sums of $1400 with less than two weeks notice.

But that's beside the point. Back to my being dropped - I submitted a request for a leave of absence through my academic advisor for this term because I was about to be laid off from work and traveling back to the U.S. from overseas, trying to find a place to settle until I go back to work in August, and I didn't want my grades to suffer for it.

I was told that this would not be a problem and I received a form to fill out and sign. I scanned it and sent it back, got no response, so after a week went by I sent it again. Still no response. I got busy with packing up and moving and traveling and figured it was okay. My mistake. I'm listed as failure to register for classes and letting this lapse two weeks into the new term, therefore I have been dropped.

Now while trying to resolve it, because I have forwarded the original email on to the university in an effort to clear this up, I'm being told that there is no time stamp on the email so it's really not useful. I asked them why they thought I would be making this up since I am a straight A student and on the Dean's list. I just don't get it.

In the meantime, I figured up what I owe. It's not much less than what they claim I owe, but the fact that I now have to pay it in a lump sum instead of the payments through Nelnet Services is very frustrating, I will have to charge it on my high interest credit card that I'm trying to pay off.

And I was doing so well...

Looking at some of the other reports in here, it seems like the Kaplan credits are non-transferable to most other state universities, and I had planned to apply to one in the next year or two. Maybe it's better that I part ways with this school now before I invest too much in it.