Good advice Equalizer. I think at this point she has no choice anyway. You also bring up another good point when you said

"She only gets away with it, as you put it, because people are willing to sign such outrages contracts." Too many teachers are too weak to say "I will never sign such an unfair, one-sided contract"

Even though I still think she should not have signed that illegal contract, but after traveling 5,000 miles based on the word of Ms. Tang and not knowing what other options she might have here, I can understand she probably felt like she had no choice. Note that Katherine was not provided a copy of a contract to read until after she arrived in Beijing. I think this shows the deception is well-planned by Ms. Tang. Katherine probably would have remained in America if she had a chance to review that contract by email.

Since I got involved in this argument yesterday I surfed the net for three hours and I noticed one very disturbing thing... China ESL advertises heavily on every expat forum in Beijing and Shanghai inclundg TBJ. I am not sure, but my guessetimate is that she spends about $10,000 a year to post ads on TBJ that basically are designed to recruit teachers under false pretenses. But what really makes this situation stink (bad) is that people who really complain and expose this woman have their posts and even entire threads deleted!!! The user "Bannoy" just had his 2 year-old thread deleted that apparently have 5-6 attacks on China ESL, and a personal friend of mine gave me this link which he said he posted here in 2008 about China ESL and Ms. Tang threatening to blacklist and deport people who make any formal or public complaints about her. http://www.thebeijinger.com/forum/2008/10/23/Do-you-know-anything-about-... People at other forums make reference to this now-missing post.

So where is this post now? Who deleted it and why? Did Ms. Tang hire a hacker to make it evaporate or ????? Who deleted Bannoy's entire thread about 10 days ago - and why? I think there is an obvious conflict of interest going on with an advertiser who has very deep pockets and apparently government contacts. I mean how could she cheat people for so long and still be in business?"

China is not a lawful place

This is correct. China has sound laws, but still it is not lawful. As a foreigner, even if you have a sound contract, there is not much you can do if the Chinese side of the contract chooses simply not to abide by all the terms. Then you find yourself in negotiations over articles in the contract that were already agreed to and signed in the original contract. In China, even with a sound, legal contract, the Chinese will try to "pick and choose" or even twist which terms they can follow. Even they try to claim they did not realize a certain "clause" was in the contract. Go figure that, when, for example, there is a 50 page contract and every single page is seperately signed by both parties. What a mess. And if it is a important customer you cannot afford to lose, the choice is to require allot of money upfront, periodic payments tied to your services, where you minimize your risk when the game starts.

If I was applying for a teaching position, why not write into the contract that should a dispute arise during the execution of the contract, some independent org or person will decide the arbitration, such as the school the teacher is working at. If this is unacceptable to this Tang character, then she can go fck herself.

@The Equalizer

I'm sorry you think I was being condescending or insulting to Katherine. I was genuinely just trying to see both sides of the argument.

And yes, I think the situation between Katherine and ChinaESL was very different than that between me and Jay and Shaw. Firstly, there was simply no information online about how a FIPE should work, so I trusted what a lawyer said. Secondly, i paid them for a service, which they failed to provide, and lied about. So I complained on here about here. I don't think I criticized Katherine for complaining.

But you are right, i should have posted an update on that situation. I just haven't been on here much in the past few months. Apologies for that. But FYI, I got my refund. 90% to be exact. More than anyone thought i would possibly get.

Pls PM me with your email address Equalizer, and I'll send you the receipt slip showing the money they transferred back to me, as I know you will require evidence.

@mrs.bumblebeeass..Conmgrads on your 90% refund. No proof required. Its actualy a drop in the sea in my scope of things. I was just wondering why you didn't keep your promise. You did promise this site to let us all know when the smoke cleared and all was said and done and I hadn't read it. To my knowledge no one forced you to make such a commitment. Thats all, no more, no less. As far as your case being different than katherines' you are right. But the way you had your panties all twisted up on this site was similiar to katherine, hence it reminded me of you. You were writing things almost uncomprehsible, and for sure some of the logic was illogical. Most of it was your personal feelings and nothing to do with any legality. If you had a brain you might be dangerous. Pls grow a good set of tits. You seem much calmer now so this is a good thing. I suppose congrads on finally finding someone to fck your eyes out too. JEEZ H. C.

I too was restricted from commenting…..my message is just to all foreigners thinking of coming to China. BE-AWARE….perhaps come with multiple job offers on the table ane enough to live in a cheap hotel for a few weeks at the very least….

Today one of our teacher asked me to write things from my side. So that people know things from my side.

1. We never used any money to let the website to delete any comment or ad. Anyone can check with the website. There is no need for us to do it. Even the best companies on the world got complains, noone can satisfy everyone. Just do myself is ok. I don't want to repeat again, but we always follow the contract. Everything we do is agreed on. We NEVER threaten anyone to sign the contract. Foreigners are adults they have their mind, I m always very kind, if you sign it is ok, if you do not sign, it is fine. Someone said we threaten people to sign the contract. It is ridiculous. Tell me how we can do it? Also people said we threaten someone if they sent bad information about us. It is so ridiculous. How can we do it? Everyone has right to write things. How can we stop them? We never did and will never do.

2. We always sign the contract before the teachers come written all the basic information which contains about the deposit, salary, benefit and all key information and it is the same information as the formal contract. We always did and will always follow the contract. You can ask anyone who finishes the contract, if they get the deposit and the airfare. I can 100% yes, everyone who finishes the contract got the deposit and the airfare.

3. All the salary amount and everything are agreed on. As I said to operate a company the school of course needs to pay us a bit more, but we also have to afford the housing and all the risk when we sign the contract with the schools.

4. To clarify again, Katherine's rent was afforded by us. The landlord didn't stop cooperating with us. He said he understood our point of view, because he is a housing agent, he got the apartment from the actual landlord in a lower price and rent us in a higher price, but he also had to afford risk. So there is nothing about stopping cooperation. We still have a good relationship. But I gave the room back to me and lost 5000 Yuan because I admit I can not sublet the room out and I m willing to give it back to me and let him rent it to someone else. Also the school didn't stop working with us, in opposite, they said they would like another ten teachers from us for the new semester.

5. We have lots of foreign teachers finished the contract and write us the reference as well. To be an adult, after you sign the contract, you should follow it, not sign it and then break it and tell everyone the other party is so bad, there is nothing about good or bad, it is the business rule. Just like I signed the contract for the house, now Katherine left I can not sublet it, I lost one month rent and one month deposit, but I admit, that is the contract I signed.

6. We helped lots of new people come to China, many of them had no experience, no degree, no idea about teaching and Beijing. We had to help them to start everything from the scratch. Many people said if without us they could never make their dream coming to Beijing true. Because all the schools in Beijing need a face to face interview. They have no idea where to stay when they come and what if the interview fails. But ChinaESL helped them to come and provided them free accommodation, all the help for the beginning, which is the hardest time. We work very hard to help them to arrange everything.

Again, we always follow the contract and we never threaten anyone not to do something. Different people stand in different points of view. But without evidence, please do not make rumour like ChinaESL paid the money to delete the ad or ChinaESL threaten people not to do something or the schools all stopped working with ChinaESL, etc.

I don't come to this forum often. But again, I can say I didn't lie to anyone and I always keep the promise and follow the contract.

Girl,

we all went through ChinaESL and we all sucked it up.

When you come to China don't believe anything they say.

I stayed in Rebecca's house but after a week I realized how shady she was, I gave 100RMB per night spent and went to live somewhere else.

That's it! You should have done that!

I am fairly new to this forum but it did not take me more than an hour to read over 50 links about Rebecca Tang and China ESL all over the internet. The posts that were not exposing her as a greedy thief/extorter were obvious shills. But just in this one case of Katherine Cox, all I need to see is atthis link

http://www.thebeijinger.com/forum/2013/01/31/beware-chinaesl-scam-alert-...

Rebecca Tang is Chinese, and she knows the law better than any of us foreigners. She knew it was illegal for teacher Cox to work in China on a L or F visa but she told her to violate the law because she was too dman cheap to sponsor her Z Visa. And once she had here in China working illegally, she had the poor girl over a barrel like a puppet on a string.

This was a scheme right form the start - before Katherine Cox even bought her plane ticket. Over 20 other people including one former China ESL employee even said so in the "Bannoy Thread" that conveniently disappeared. The way I see it Rebecca Tang is a devious fraudster that makes money five different ways off of foreign teachers;

* She claims and takes 2/3 of a teacher's salary
* She rents apartments to her teacher recruits
* She makes them work unpaid overtime (slave labor)
* She gets kick-backs from the visa agent she sends the FTs
* She has the nerve to "sell release" letters that the law mandates be given to every terminated employee - not sold.

To add insult to injury just look at the terms of her contract! "She will blacklist teachers" who do not jump through her hoops!!! I wonder how many blacklists Rebecca Tang is on!?!

Yes, of course, Katherine signed that crappy contract, but notice that she never got to see a copy until she already spent a couple thousand dollars to move here to China. Then when she learsn she cannot work anywhere else with the Z visa Rebecca deliberately didn't tell her about, she probably felt she had only two choices - either cooperate with Rebecca or go back home.

I never met this woman Rebecca and frankly don't want to. As a professional HR director for over 5 years I can see she is not only greedy but an evil schemer. Honestly, if Katherine Cox was mu daughter or sister, I would hunt that woman down and beat her with a stick before putting her photo up on Weibo. She is a disgrace to Chinese society and it is people like her that taint Chinese people with the reputation of all being cheaters. But I suppose in her mind, she is probably proud of herself for 1) Saving money and 2) being so "clever". Rebecca Tang, as a human being you should be ashamed of yourself. With all that money she's been swindling from teachers, she must fly the best broom in town!

It's not a bug, it's a feature.

Thank you Katherine, that is a great "feature" they have to suppress and argument whenever it might be convenient. But I saw a post by another poster "Martin" who cliams the spam filter is broken. So lets give them the benefit of the doubt since you were able to help me get my post up But you forgot to post the photo that I think suits this situation quite well.

Also, I know it doesn't make your her deeds any less evil, or your stress any less, but what Rebecca Tang did to you appears to be the M.O. of most of the agents in China according to this article - http://open.salon.com/blog/china_business_central/2012/12/16/china_scam_... But your Rebecca sure does get a lot of ink on the links and may be one of the worst offenders? I'd be shocked if she is just "average".

Okay, maybe this Rebecca Tang lady is a bad, evil, sneaky, greedy, dishonest, and unethical scoundrel - just like you say, but from what I've been reading online, she's nothing really that special...

http://open.salon.com/blog/china_business_central/2012/12/16/china_scam_...

So maybe B. English has just been here a few years longer than most of us and has "adjusted" his moral standards for the practical convenience of daily life? Did you really think anyone is going to raise the bar for western visitors?

Bottom line, dishonesty is an integral part of Chinese culture - get used to it or go home. By Chinese standards Rebecca Tang is probably a role model.

Thank you Katherine, But you forgot to post the photo that I think suits this situation quite well.

This woman Rebecca Tang attempts to vindicate herself by saying teacher Cox signed her illegal contract. This is hogwash and any lawyer would tell you so. And did you see that clause about “blacklisting” the teachers that don’t break the law as she instructs them to do with their visas?!?

Also, I know it doesn't make your her deeds any less evil, or your stress any less, but what Rebecca Tang did to you appears to be the M.O. of most of the shady agents in China according to the article Morrison pointed out. But your dear Rebecca sure does get a lot of ink on the links and may be one of the worst offenders? I'd be shocked if she is just "average" like B. English and Morrison suggest.

BTW... is admin going to explain what happened to the 2 year-old thread started by the user "Bannoy" in the "Teaching English" directory that just vaporized over the last three weeks? Many people know that thread documented a lot of abuse at the hands of China ESL and now the evidence just vanished while we are talking about it here in this thread. Why? Did this Rebecca hire a hacker to delete it or did the TBJ do it, and if so why?

You are right - this is not America. Chinese lady just try to make as much bizness money as possible. In America probably do same to the Chinese. For many hundred years many foreigner from many country cheat and lute China for millions and millions of dollar. Now a little happen in reverse and OMG - 2 pages of crying over small money!

Girl teacher is not too smart to sign that contract and need to learn lesson. Best for her to go back to America and now everyone know this Chinese Tang lady is too much greedy and too much clever. Maybe should be punished? Time to move on - cannot change the past.