The Voice - Consumer's Voice

Is this university real?

This serves to find out if you are familiar with Atlantic International University. I am considering taking a degree course with them and I am not sure if they are a recognized institute. They say they are registered with Accrediting Commission International (ACI) and International Accrediting Organization (IAO), they are both international private accrediting agency.

Thank you.

Atlantic International University is a fake university. They even confess this on their web site. They say that their programs are not “are unique, non-traditional and not accredited by the U.S. Department of Education”.

So they’re not actually accredited. Even the agencies that they claim have accredited them, aren’t real accreditation agencies, they’re just as fake as AIU. They even admit this as well. They say that these bodies are “not regulated or approved by the US Department of Education”.

I found an education authority in the USA that said that any establishment “accredited by ACI … is either fake or substandard”.

Atlantic International University is a fake university accredited by a fake organization that sells fake degrees, it’s as simple as that. “Qualifications” you buy from AIU are worthless and won't be recognized in Botswana. You must also realize that if you ever got a job or a promotion using a fake degree like one from AIU you’d be a criminal. You’ll have “obtained by false pretences” and your employer will probably fire you immediately, call the cops and have you charged. You could end up in prison.

Finally there’s a strange thing. They claim to be based in Hawaii. So why do they call themselves "Atlantic International University"? Hawaii is in the Pacific Ocean, not the Atlantic. Don’t they teach geography?

Can they take the money?

I write requesting clarification on an issue concerning one of our financial institutions. If one stumbles into money in their bank account that they can't account for, what is the procedure for accountability? Who is to blame? Can it be transferred back without the knowledge of the account holder that has received it? As the account holder what are your rights as far as the last mentioned question is concerned? Can they do that? If one went to the extent of spending the money, what regulations are in place to ensure fairness in such a situation? And my golden question, in the event of money spent what are the likely outcomes?

There’s a very simple rule here. You can’t spend money that belongs to someone else. You simply can’t. If I visited your house and dropped some money on your floor would you be entitled to keep it and spend it? Of course not.

It’s exactly the same situation here. If the bank makes a mistake and deposits money into your account rather than mine you’re not allowed to spend it and the bank is entitled to reverse the transaction when they notice it.

Of course they shouldn’t disadvantage you because of this. They shouldn’t charge you for the transfer into your account or the one out of it, that’s their responsibility. The difficulty is what happens if you spend the money without noticing and when they take it back it takes you overdrawn. Again technically that’s your fault, not theirs, but I would expect the bank to be tolerant in that situation. Yes, you should have noticed that you were spending more than you should have had in your account but I would certainly expect them to be flexible.