Policies & Procedures

General Policies  

At our day to day representation of students, we adhere to the following principles of communication:

Accessible Consultants:  You can contact us either by phone or email. If you send us an email or if we cannot answer the phone immediately, we will contact you back within the same hour if possible or within the next 1-10  hours when we are free. We treat you as if you are a brother, sister or other relative or friend who depends on our guidance and support.

Keeping abreast of New Trends & Developments:  Staying current and on top of developments and depth of knowledge is the key to our practice success. Publications, continuing legal education and an expanding network of contacts within the immigration community are essential ingredients of our consistent success.

Each file is important to us and a lawyer is assigned to each file. NO application or appeal is filed until it has been thoroughly checked and reviewed by experienced immigration lawyer for accuracy and completeness.

Credentials: We have valid certificates in the areas of work study permits and other required areas in all three countries that we provide support for. If and when it becomes a goal to support students in other parts of the world, we will work towards achieving the necessary certificates in those countries as well.

We have officially worked with foreign students since 2009 but have had informal relationships with students of many different countries, cultures and backgrounds as far back as 2000.

Fair Fees and Free Services:  There are no hidden fees or suprises.  There may be services that we provide which we don’t charge for that we may not necessarily mention. We simply do them to provide added value that students appreciate.

The fees that we do quote for are laid out in writing in our representation agreement.  The initial sign-up fee of $150 is non-refundable. It is a standard fee that agencies charge for three reasons:
1. The pre-visa work that we need to do get paperwork started on applications.
2. This fee gets the student committed and it is made clear that the student must do his/her part in document collection.
3. It covers our time and expenses for the initial start-up process.

Post-Visa Representation:  Once the student is accepted for a visa to travel and study overseas, we then represent the student and communicate with the college or university they are interested in. The college or university the student will be attending pays us for our work, so the student never has to feel like they have to keep paying us for things we do on their behalf once they arrive at their new destination.

Integrity & Dedication: You matter to us. That’s why we work 7 days a week on your behalf. The difference many times in whether a student gets good information to make judgment calls comes because we go the extra mile. Approval or rejection often comes because an official sees how important this is to the student and how badly they want it and how well they have prepared and how efficient they are in providing the right documentation.

Representation Policy  
If any documents are found to be forged, BLF Consultancy will not guarantee any refunds. For more information regarding other enrollment policies, please contact us.

Refund Policy
We provide full refunds to students based on the agreements laid out in our Representation Agreement.  The initial up-front $150 fee is non-refundable unless any pre-visa work that is needed is not done. From the initial retainer fee to the services provided or not provided after a visa has been granted but not completed, the student will get a refund. The rest of the fees that a student negotiates with airlines, home stays or other interested parties is up to the situation that we cannot speak for. 

Although we will gladly do our part in finding the best prices and value for service which these other parties are looking for the student to pay. We can often suggest what is a good deal and what is not such a good deal. Cell phone carriers are a good example of where students really have to do their homework (or what we can do for them) before signing up for a term contract once they arrive at the new destination.

This policy is an assurance that we mean what we say and do what we say we will do when we say we will do it. If for any reason, work is not completed, indicated work will either be done at a later date notified and agreed upon or a refund will be issued if there is no agreement or if logistically, that work cannot be done due to time constraints, location, distance, etc.

Working and Representational Policy
We will provide a record or records of persuants to documentation from immigration officials, judges, visa officers or other officials and/or partners working on the student’s behalf and BLF Consultancy.

We will monitor the progress of such documents and update the student as we find out “blow-by-blow”, meaning that as soon as information comes available, we will inform the student.

It is our policy to submit your student visa application as soon as we have all the right documents from you, as the student applying and we make sure that you are informed of all the possible scenarios of what can and should happen when things go according to plan, but also plan for things that may not go 100% the way we hoped. As the saying goes “Life happens when we are busy making other plans”.

We will provide a free half hour initial consultation and provide informal information sessions along the journey that you will have from the first point of contact you have with us to the time you arrive at your new school and future times after. We would like to stay in touch with you to make sure everything goes smooth. Call us for questions or advice or email us if you just have a quick question or two.

Privacy
We take our customers’ privacy very seriously. All documentation provided by students are held in confidence and only provided to agents and officials in government departments or other officials that require proof of one kind or another. We promise and declare that we will not share private information you have disclosed with us to any third party that does not require that information for the approval process to go in your favor.

We will not sell or share such private information including things like email addresses or government-issued documents. Contact us to book an appointment to take advantage of our free half hour initial consultation.  

Website Traffic and Data   
In order to serve our student customers better, it is important that we collect data from our website so that we know what students are most interested in. If they click on one page more than another, we need to know why in order to give that page more attention and importance. We can then provide additional information based on the pages and get more questions answered.

Therefore, we collect survey data as well as data that is part of and with a log file. The bottom line is that we strive to provide a better user experience for new visitors and students coming back to get more information. Keywords that visitors type into Google and other search engines allows us to find insights associated to those keywords so we can then create quicker and easier links and navigation so the student doesn’t spend more time on the website than they have to. People generally want to find out information with as few clicks as possible, so we strive to provide this easy experience. We continue to work at this every day. The last thing we want is for a student to be frustrated or think that we don’t have their experience in mind. To that end, if you have any thoughts or feedback regarding improving the navigational experience of the website, please let us know so we can better your experience even more.

Cookies    
The website uses cookies as a default to store information. A visitor can turn cookies off if they choose. I do not recommend turning cookies off because firstly, it will not help us improve the navigational experience and secondly, we have a privacy policy that overrides any information we collect on the website, so we always have the student’s best interest in mind.

Advertisers target searchers on search engines so they can provide content-tailored and geographical-targeted ads. This helps avoid ads that don’t mean anything to the searcher. Your browsing history will build what are known as “Double-click Dart” type cookies. These are specific cookies based on information you tend to look for when searching. Personal info is not tracked though. Things like your email, phone number, name, address or other personal info is not targeted. You can opt out by going to http://www.doubleclick.com/privacy/dart_adserving.aspx .

If you do choose to opt out, your experience will not be as smooth and quick, so I tend to recommend keeping cookies on. It is a better option and outweighs any negatives. I personally never worry about cookies because if I ever get emails that I have decided not to deal with anymore, I simply do a “select all” and delete or opt out from a specific advertiser individually if I notice my time getting wasted or if I really care. When you delete cookies, it is only temporary anyway. Cookies are added each time you visit a website.

Opting out tends to create other problems like always having to put all your information into text fields again when on forums or other websites that you typically visit that require authentication before getting access to the site’s contents. It will become more trouble than it is worth. If you would like any more information regarding any policy subjects described herein, please contact us at 1-647-478-3975 or email us here.