ICS www.icslearn.co.uk

It is a complete waste of money. There is zero support for the money you pay. They just give you access to a portal with some powerpoint slides and expect you to complete assignments based on it. The assessment briefs change every year without any notice and leave you high and dry. I tried to do my CIPD diploma through ICS and lost all my money. Could not do a single unit due to the complete lack of communication from ICS. DONT JOIN! They dont have a google reviews page. That speaks volumes!

Attempting to complete a course via ICS Learn was unfortunately a massive waste of time and money for me - so much so that I gave up on the course as 'dead money' rather than continue damaging my mental health trying to engage with their barebones, boring content and finicky, slow, and often contrary moderation. ICS Learn repeatedly change the goalposts to minimise their workload and maximise opportunities for profit, even if it means a poorer service, worse grades, and less feedback for students attempting to learn.

The annual module change was chaotic as ICS Learn failed to address significant worries popping up all over their forums about confusing language and contradictory or impractical demands. In general, their CS team is unhelpful at anything that doesn't involve taking your money. Case in point, it took them over a week to send me a generic, tone-deaf email response that didn't address or even acknowledge that a tutor had given me unambiguously false advice.

This company has put me off this format of online learning for life.

This organisation has a lot of negative reviews and it is very telling! I even had colleagues, who chose this provider, tell me not to go with them as they do not offer support, no number to even call them for support and no academic journals they can offer when they are so important as we need them to do well in our assignments.

Regardless of the above, I still decided to enquiry as I wanted to make a judgement for myself. I can not believe how unprofessional their customer service is! When I was first inquiring, he provided me the crucial information I needed then today he contacted me asking if I had reviewed the information and for an update as to if I would like to sign up with them for my CIPD. I told him no I decided to go with another provider to which he then asked me why and who the provider was. I gave him the reasons why and rather than accepting the reasons, this then turns into a back and forth text message argument with him and his condescending comments about ''if I had done further research, I would see that ICS is a top rated provider for CIPD.'' How unprofessional and rude this guy is and this is the face/1st point of contact you want for your organisation?! I also find it appalling that my colleague was quoted a cheaper rate than I was and I can only get it in that rate if I had gotten that rate from another provider to then which they would want to see an email as proof of the rate and they will price match it? Why the hell would I go through all that effort? So ridiculous and absurd when I know the organisation can give me the same price, they instead tell me that the price is 50% more than other providers?! 50% more for what? Top rated provider yet all you see is majority of review sites of them is just negative! Clearly enough research had been done from my side to see that they are not a top rated provider and after this rude and unprofessional experience, now I will definitely never use this provider for anything and will tell others to avoid!

They definitely need more training on how to be polite and how to do customer service, not fight with potential customers just cause we decided not to go with this provider and make snarky and condescending comments. Absolute appalling behavior!

I am doing the Level 5 Diploma in Organisational Learning and Development. I'm 6 months in. I regret doing this course with ICS Learn.

The main problems;

- The course content is low quality and full of spelling mistakes, links that don't work and a lack of research and evidence. It's also outdated. A tutor told me that hardly anyone passes their assignment the first time. I suspect this is because the course content quality and level of support is low.

- I've now had two assignments back and the feedback on both occasions has been vague and unhelpful. You are not actually told why you need to resubmit, what is missing and how you can improve. You are left guessing and feeling confused. For the money I've paid, I expect clear and detailed feedback, rather than obvious copy and paste responses. It's also clear that markers do not read your assignment properly as they tell you you need to do things that are already in the assignment.

- Assignments are not blind marked and you are required to write your name. This is outdated practice for obvious reasons (markers are likely to be prejudiced when they see foreign names). You have to submit your student number and this should be sufficient.

- Doing a draft submission is a complete waste of time as the feedback is vague and you have no idea if your answer would pass or not, as you're not told. You are left feeling confused about whether your answer was any good or not and if it needs improving and how.

- You do not get assigned a named tutor to offer consistent help throughout the course. You are left alone and all the talk about support is simply not true. Students should have a named tutor that we meet regularly. ICS Learn feels very impersonal.

- The masterclasses add nothing to your learning and are very basic.

- There's a lot of forum posts that are left unanswered. Tutors should be replying to students but don't seem to be interested.

- I'm unhappy that I have been misled but cannot get a full refund now I can see the course is very poor quality.

- I think ICS Learn just want your money and they're very good at being responsive when you first enquire. That's why they have so many good Trustpilot reviews (they ask you to write a review as soon as you sign up, which i regret doing). However, do take a look at reviews of ICS Learn on other websites (and the negative Trustpilot reviews) to see what students who are actually doing their courses think.

In summary, avoid ICS Learn at all costs. I will not be doing my level 7 with them.

Spelling mistakes, incorrect grammar, poor learning materials and incompetent markers.

Tried to complete their CIPD Level 5 course. Found the learning material to be slideshow after slideshow with multiple spelling mistakes and poor grammar. Made me feel silly paying over £2000 for a course which has been poorly put together.

Don't know how these guys have so many 5 stars review on Trustpilot when ICS is being slated and to be avoided in multiple Facebook groups.

I have completed 2 out of the 7 Units in which I did not use a single piece of their materials since the first module after experiencing how badly written their learning material was.

All you are doing is paying them to mark your work as a "assessment centre" which is required by CIPD moderators. Even the marking is abysmal, as someone who is graduated to a Level 7, I have been able to distinguish between competent qualified markers and assessors whereas ICS seem to employ anyone to mark. The assessors feedback always contain multiple spelling mistakes, poor grammar and feedback in improving work and a typical copy and paste job.

I have decided to cancel my course and decided to join another programme which is better put together by those who review their learning material rather than this greedy incompetent company.

Anyone looking to learn with ICS, please avoid at all costs.

Their entire policies seem to be centered around making as much possible money off students whereas the course material is highly generic and unengaging,definetely not worth the money that they are charging. Students are left to basically fend for their own with minimal guidance provided by tutors.

Would especially emphasise reading the fine print in their contracts as they have a highly exorbitant cancellation policy with no refund offered at all in any circumstances if you need to cancel the course. This is not explicitly highlighted to their clients when starting the course but is later bought up as a convenient means to bind customers to keep on paying even after discontinuing with the program.

They will also keep on hounding customers until they receive their cancellation fee regardless of whether the customer is continuing with the course or not.

A highly commercialized setup with little or no value for their students provided. Would definetely reccomend individuals and all professional organizations to avoid any sort of learning and development engagement with them as there are much better options.

I am a Filipina, working in Singapore way back in 1994. I asked my employer if i could study through a correspondence school while working as a nanny. He said yes, so i took the opportunity to enroll in ICS and took up Business Management course.

The ICS learning materials including Modules and Test Papers are easy to understand if you are passionate enough to learn. Though there were subjects that are difficult to understand because i didn't have access to library for further research. But through determination, couraged, and with the helped of my tutor's guidance, i had managed to finished my 2 year course and obtained a diploma and transcript despite of many difficulties. I had several worked experienced in some of the global companies like Samsung Electronics.

I am sad to read all these negative comments and reviews about ICS online study. I think the good old days of distance learning are gone. ????

Thank you ICS Singapore for the oppprtunity. Now, i'm an online trader. ????

Do not get registered with ICS. They provide no support throughout the course and the indicative content is not sufficient. It takes ages to mark the assignments and the feedback they give shows a lack of subject knowledge.

They don’t provide any one to one tutoring nor are they available to your concerns and questions.

In addition you must pay 500£ to cancel the course which isn’t mentioned clearly!

Absolutely appalled that I have paid for my level 2 and told I could start it at any time but once I started it I would have only 6 months to complete the course. For this reason I have waiting to ensure I am able to spare the time to complete the work now ready and told that was all nonsense and my course has expired!!!