·        This page has details about how online lessons are conducted, cancellation and refund policy.

About your online lessons:

We email you with a worksheet(s) for class beforehand as a pdf.  If you are also signed up to get self-study, you will receive another email with your study pack separately each Friday morning.

·         On the day of the lesson, for lessons using Zoom, the meeting will open once the teacher is there, you just need to click on the link and wait.  If you try to join before the lesson time and get a message saying you the host is in another meeting do not worry.  The teacher will be finishing the class prior to yours.

·         For scheduling lesson times, we always use Lisbon (Portugal) time, we can’t take any responsibility for working out time differences if there are any.

·         You will receive all lesson notes as a word document after the lesson.

·         1hour lessons are 55mins long, half hour 25mins.  This allows 5 mins for admin.

·         In order to have an online class, you must ensure that your internet speed is a minimum of 8mbps download and 0.5mbps upload.   Lower than this and you may have difficulty connecting and have glitches during the call.  Connecting your device with an ethernet cable to the router can really help if the speed is borderline.

How to best test speed.

1 – Go to google .com

2 – Search ‘Internet speed test’

3 – Click on the blue button:  ‘Run speed test’

4 – Wait for the test to run (about 10 seconds).

5 – You get the result, telling you if your internet is (very) slow or fast. 

About cancellations:

If you need to cancel a lesson we've arranged, we’d appreciate it if you could give us the maximum notice possible.  Often it's no problem as we can reschedule.  If you have booked using the online booking system you can easily alter your booking online. If the time / day you would like to change to is not available, contact your teacher, they may need to open up an extra booking slot for you.

·         If  it is not possible to reschedule, we have a policy of charging 100% of the lesson cost for cancellations with less than 24 hours’ notice.   Unless we hear back from you, we will presume you agree to this.  If this is not acceptable to you, please let us know immediately.

We work hard to ensure that we are as up to date as possible with all technological updates and strive to avoid any unexpected glitches technology-wise interfering with classes.  There can very occasionally be an issue our end and we have to alter lessons at short notice.  This is something we cannot avoid, and we, obviously, do not charge you anything for lessons cancelled where an issue our end affects a lesson.  

We would like to emphasise that if you have a technological problem that means you miss a lesson, then, although we are understanding, it has to be charged as a missed lesson as per our standard policy.

We have a policy of waiting 10 minutes from the beginning of class and if you are unable to connect, then we will consider the class cancelled.

We would like to suggest that you ensure that you are up to date with all updates etc so you don't have any unexpected last minute surprises tech-wise.  For example, with Zoom, if you find you are having issues, uninstalling and then re-installing the app on your device should resolve the issue.  If you find that you are often having issues with a platform, then having a back-up platform to use may be a good idea (e.g. googlemeet or Skype).  Talk to your teacher if you want to set up a back-up way of having lessons, we are very open to having lessons on other platforms.

Refund policy:

Once you have paid, we will send out the materials, if this is part of your course.  We are totally understanding of exceptional circumstances that would lead to you needing to cancel or change dates of courses or lessons. However, in normal circumstances, regarding refunds, if you have lessons or access materials in the 14 days after payment is made any refund will be a proportionate sum minus administrative costs.  After 14 days any refund will be subject to a 15% administrative charge (although we are happy to credit the full amount to a different / future course).