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Report: #786928

Complaint Review: Wyzant - Chicago Illinois

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  • Reported By: More Qualified Than You — Bronx New York United States of America
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  • Wyzant 1714 N Damen Ave Chicago, Illinois United States of America

Wyzant Took background check money and soon deleted profile Chicago, Illinois

*UPDATE Employee: Not enough info on you

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I signed up as a tutor on the Wyzant site and qualified to tutor in 60 subject areas.  Nevertheless, no matter what I did to try to entice people to my profile, nothing was successful.  They eventually deleted my tutor page, into which I had put time, effort, and money (which I spent on a background check, which I passed, and which they would not refund after deleting my profile).  The vast majority of tutoring opportunities that came my way were either college students who needed assistance that was beyond my expertise or people that wanted help with something very specific that was again, beyond my area of expertise.  Most of the "tutor wanted" posts were in mathematics, engineering, and accounting, none of which am I qualified to teach.  Many people wanted the same tutor for both mathematics and English, which probably won't result in the best tutoring.

I taught a total of one session.  The subject matter was a philosophy survey course.  The student lived with his older sister, who arranged everything.  She was clearly dissatisfied with me from the get-go because I was not able to tutor off the top of my head.  All my previous tutoring experience was with helping students understand difficult material, not trying to teach people off the top of my head in fields that are auxiliary to my own study.  The course had no textbook, so I used Wikipedia.  I understood the material fully, and had to keep reconceptualizing it in order to get the student to understand.  He kept wanting to reinterpret the philosopher's theory into something opposite to what it was, perhaps to fit it in more with his personal beliefs. Neither he nor his sister seemed to undersand that you don't have to agree with the philosopher--the point is to understand what they're saying so that you can challenge it, if necessary, and some of the philosophers came from an atheistic point of view with which they were in total disagreement, causing them both to constantly reconstrue what I was trying to explain.   I was in no way endorsing any of the philosophers under discussion, just trying to make sure that the student understood what the philosopher was saying.  I asked for feedback, but she provided none and was advertising for another tutor.  Apparently, she wasn't so dissatisfied that she wanted to leave negative feedback that could have hurt me.

Wyzant removed my profile from the site once before, but restored it at my request.  Wyzant rejected my request to restore it the second time.  Unless you are a whiz at math and engineering, don't sign up for this site.

Wyzant takes 40% of your fee, but that amount reduces as you teach more sessions.  It seems that their goal is to make sure that no one teaches enough sessions for them to not collect the maximum amount of money.

This report was posted on Ripoff Report on 10/10/2011 09:02 AM and is a permanent record located here: https://www.ripoffreport.com/reports/wyzant/chicago-illinois-60647/wyzant-took-background-check-money-and-soon-deleted-profile-chicago-illinois-786928. The posting time indicated is Arizona local time. Arizona does not observe daylight savings so the post time may be Mountain or Pacific depending on the time of year. Ripoff Report has an exclusive license to this report. It may not be copied without the written permission of Ripoff Report. READ: Foreign websites steal our content

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#1 UPDATE Employee

Not enough info on you

AUTHOR: Aaron - (United States of America)

POSTED: Friday, March 30, 2012

I am a tutor on WyzAnt.

First off, I would like to say that it is free to sign up.  If you paid for a background check, you did so at your own risk.  There are thousands of satisfied tutors on the site who get tons of students.  Many students are willing to pay for the background check.  I passed 2 background checks my first year without paying for either one.  I got many students just fine before I had passed a background check.

You didn't say what your qualifications are, but if you can't tutor college level, and can't find any students with easy enough classes for you to tutor, maybe you shouldn't be trying to use WyzAnt.  Tutors are expected to have certain subjects mastered to the point of being able to tutor them.

You also didn't say what you were trying to charge.  When you first start out, you cannot make much money.  You have no reviews and no hours so the students you get will be the ones who want a very inexpensive tutor.  I started at $25/hr and it took some time to get enough reviews and students so that I could raise my rate.  I drove up to 20 minutes one way sometimes.  After taxes, commission and gas I made about $8/hr.  This is the cost of starting up.  You have to be willing to make accommodations.

Also, you didn't say how many students you contacted.  In the beginning, only a small percentage of students I contacted chose me.  More recently at least a third of all students I contact want me.

As for your claim that no one gets past the 40% commission level, it just isn't true.  You can do a quick tutor search and find many tutors who have over 50 or 100 hours logged.  I am at over 100 hours and my cut is 70%.  Also, many students buy bulk packages, and the discount is off of WyzAnt's cut, not yours.  Now that my rate is up to $35, I am at 70%, and I have 4.82 stars and 3 good reviews, I take home a good $15/hr even with travel time.

It makes sense that WyzAnt doesn't want profiles listed that never got any business.

Aaron

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