What happens after a refund?

[vinod]

When a student enrolls for a course, he/she has a lifetime access to the course. But if he/she gets a refund for that course, will the student still be able to access the course?

Also, once the refund is done, why does the student's rating kept?

Just wondering...

[Abbie · Accepted solution]

Hi @vinod,

Students do get lifetime access for the courses they enroll in. However, whenever a course is refunded, access is removed from the student's account. 

I know it’s really frustrating to see a review from someone who has refunded the course. We can’t delete the review because it is an honest review, even if it’s not the best circumstances. However, you can take control of the narrative! Respond to the review and address the points that the student mentioned, so that future students see that you’re active and have the right expectations going into your course.

[vinod]

Thanks @Abbie 

But the student didn't leave any written review, but just rated with a 1 star. The course has got over 4.5 from all other students, hence it is little hard to digest.

[Abbie]

Hi @vinod,

Keep in mind that the course rating is a weighted average of your course reviews in the last 90 days. Some reviews are more helpful than others, so we weight reviews with more written feedback, from students who consumed more of the course, etc. more than reviews with no feedback or from a student who only took a few minutes of your course.

[Laurence-Svekis]

Could be worse, the absolute most frustrating is when you get a bad or a 3 star rating on a new course.

Also the one I hate to see if  when the feedback says something like asked for review too soon.  That happens to me all the time.

[DamianMcKinnon]

The worst is when they didn't check any of the boxes which probably means they just clicked next to get the course review page out of their face.

[Haytham]

I have same issue here.

It is unfair  @Abbie 

One of my best-selling courses is affected by such students’ behavior, and dropped from 4.7 star to 4:00 stars

In my situation:

The student consumed most of the course already, and sent me a thank you message for the good quality contents, and because I have removed some lectures from the course because as an instructor, I see that it is not necessary to have these lectures in the beginner level.

After that, I found out that the student punished me by leaving 1-star review without writing even one word in his/her 1-star rating.

I hope Udemy can take into consideration of such strange behaviors; we instructors work hard to deliver quality contents, and it is really disappointing to have such behavior from some students, without having any help from Udemy in such issues.

[DamianMcKinnon]

Reviews are an absolute mess but it's clear after years of being presented with the same objections again and again that Udemy have no intention of doing anything about it.

[HaiderNaeem963]

it was happened with me too and im now working hard to avoid such cases as some student do not care to get refund or 1 star ratings too

[Laurence-Svekis]

I had the same thing happen a few days ago, and the student left feedback that was not true.  I provide code based courses and all the code obviously works since otherwise the videos could not show the working code.  Coding is tricky and if you have just one thing out of place it might not work and can throw errors.   

The student left this feedback,'does not work locally and no instructions how to use' which is totally misleading and untrue since there are instructions for every step and you can copy the source code and it works without issue.  

Often times the students don't copy the code correctly or make a change and don't see it working.   I have almost 27000 reviews and unfortunately this happens way too often and if I get a chance to discuss it with the student the issue if always on their end.

Its totally not fair as even if you get a hold of the student they cannot change it anyway so no point.  Doesn't matter how incorrect the rating and the feedback is.

I had another one where the student was saying the section 4 did not work and he had no audio.  The funny thing is there was only 3 sections in the course.  So this really isn't valid feedback but nothing can be done.

Most of the low ratings you will find also have a student that is no longer in the course.

[CoffeeBiz101]

I think I have a fair middle-ground solution that works for students and instructors.

If a student purchases the course, pokes around, doesn't like the course, leaves a bad review, and then gets a full refund, their score shouldn't be included in the final numerical score. 

However - their review, stars, and comments can stay for others to look at - so other students can best determine if the course is right for them. 

[DennisLoh]

Hi Vinod,

I believe most instructors face the same issue.

Anyway, there 2 things you can do (even the probability of success is slim).

1. Contact the students to discuss (see if they are willing to change the rating). However, most probably, they won't bother to reply.

2. Try to 'appeal', ask Udemy Support to check if the rating is valid (it could be spammed or spy bot).

Again, usually, the probability of success is really really ....slim. But, this is all you can do after a student leaving you a 1-star rating.

Cheer.