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TBI Bekasi Warning
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BekasiWhistle



Joined: 19 Jul 2013
Posts: 23
Location: Bangkok

PostPosted: Thu Aug 22, 2013 10:32 am    Post subject: TBI Bekasi Warning Reply with quote

A few weeks ago I wrote about TBI Bekasi where I worked for 6 months. The school is known to Indonesians as TBI Sun City. I was promised 11 mill a month at this school. But on pay day they only payed me 6 mill. This was a good example of the old bait and switch. Promises were made that I'd get the full 11 mill when a few more classes opened. But after 2 months I got threats instead. They said they would take me to the police for being in Indonesia with no visa if I didn't agree to work for 6 mill. I know a few teachers who worked at the same school and they all got the bait and switch.
I've tried to talk about this sensibly but every time I got on the record people from TBI come online and start talking about The Holocaust and Nazi Germany. They say I'm being a victim worse than the Holocaust for complaining. Allways the same cheap put downs. This is what happened to me. People need to know.
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bradleycooper



Joined: 12 Apr 2013
Posts: 310

PostPosted: Fri Aug 23, 2013 2:54 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

The key information for newcomers to realise is that TBI has a "two tier" system. They own 6 of the TBI schools: Kuningan, Sudirman and Fatmawati (all in Jakarta), Dago and Jalan Riau (in Bandung) and they just re-opened a school in Malang which had been closed for 8 months (due to their joint venture partner breaking the contract with them). These schools maintain a professional appearance (at least on the surface) though they do not provide teachers with tax receipts (which is a legal requirement). Former managers have said this is because the schools have avoided paying most of their income and business tax up until now. There are no possibilities for advancement (16 out of 17 schools are now Indonesian-managed) but you don't need to worry about your salary being paid in full. Unless you cross one of the Senior Managers, you may not have major problems at these branches. Many teachers who keep a low profile get through their contracts with no major upsets. If you question their authority it is another matter altogether and all bets are off. Threats of legal action for slander, threats of being deported, smear campaigns that allege you are insane... anything goes.

The other schools are all franchise schools and they are a wild and woolly bunch. I worked at a TBI franchise school myself and the standards were very low. One of the teachers had no degree or TEFL certificate at all. The school was run on a cash only basis so there were no electronic records at all. Tax slips were unheard of. Head Office appeared for a few hours once a year and that was the extent of their involvement. They are simply not interested in what goes on in the franchise schools as long as they get their royalty payements.

Having said this, TBI Bekasi is undoubtedly the worst. People have rarely lasted more than a few months there. The same complaints are made by teacher after teacher, showing the school has chronic problems. Theft of personal property, not paying the promised salary and airfare contributions and rampant sexual harassment of female staff are the most serious complaints. Head Office has been informed of the problems but they have not removed the school manager as he is a part-owner. TBI have never publically acknowledged that there is anything wrong there but I heard that in 2012 he started paying the promised salary (Rp 9.000.000 a month). Clearly they have brought some pressure to bear. But the manager still reneged on the airfare contribution and the promised bonus and TBI refused to step in and help the teacher. It is still a completely sub-standard situation.
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BekasiWhistle



Joined: 19 Jul 2013
Posts: 23
Location: Bangkok

PostPosted: Sat Aug 24, 2013 12:16 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Former TBI teachers talk about this company like it is The Mob. I've asked people from a few schools to go on record about TBI. They start talking about will they track us down, will they know who we are. They fear for their safety or ask is it okay to use fake names. This is supposed to be a language school. What language school scares people this way? Its pure madness. They need to get rid of the school manager at TBI Bekasi. He needs to go. TBI will forever be known as a Mickey Mouse school if they accept this man.
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bradleycooper



Joined: 12 Apr 2013
Posts: 310

PostPosted: Sun Aug 25, 2013 1:43 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Some of the franchise schools have been total flops. TBI Semarang went belly up at the end of last year. They had less than 50 students left last time I heard. Semarang is a city of 1.5 million people with a large Chinese-Indonesian population who are education mad. It should have been swarmed with students.

The main clue I heard as to why that one went broke was due to nepotism and embezzlement. The head of franchise appointed a relative to the school and he allegedly embezzled the $7000 marketing budget. I know this because after that incredible feat he was moved to my franchise school, TBI Kelapa Gading, as school manager. Head Office did not tell the school owner that he had been accused of sexual harassment and embezzlement at his last school. This man lasted just 2 months as school manager of my school because he had then started to steal from the marketing budget again in Kelapa Gading. At this point the school owner found out that TBI had recommended a suspected thief and sex offender as school manager and refused to speak to Head Office again for the next 18 months. When we describe TBI as dysfunctional, we have good reasons.
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BekasiWhistle



Joined: 19 Jul 2013
Posts: 23
Location: Bangkok

PostPosted: Thu Aug 29, 2013 8:56 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Working at TBI Bekasi was pure Hell. There were split shifts all over the week. You were running around Jakarta with hours of travel some days for what 6 mill a month? No one I know got more than that. If he's paying 9 mill now that must hurt the school manager ever so much because all he ever cared about was money. If he's been forced to pay 9 mill now that's a victory for everyone who stood up to this grifter at Bekasi. He was the cheapest man I've ever met. He even locked up the paper for the printer and you had to ask special permission to get it. A rotten school.
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bradleycooper



Joined: 12 Apr 2013
Posts: 310

PostPosted: Fri Aug 30, 2013 3:01 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

There has also been rampant sexism and homophobia in a lot of the attacks TBI has made on whistle-blowers, especially at the Group schools. Some of what has been said is all but unrepeatable on here.

The first woman who spoke up was cyber-bullied by some very nasty people using fake email addresses. They told her that she "stank like menstrual blood", that she was ugly and that everybody hated her etc. etc. The email addresses that this stream of vitriol were sent from were then shut down after several days to make them untraceable. Similarly Indonesian women who have stood up against the TBI bullies have frequently been described using the worst and most abusive terms that exist in the English language for women. There are actually at least 20 former Indonesian teachers who have been "black listed" by this company for raising valid criticisms.

In their latest ploy they have alleged that I (being gay) am just as bad as TBI because homosexuality is illegal in Indonesia. I have been told that because I am gay I am just as bad as the people embezzling money and running illegal visa scams at TBI! (This is factually wrong anyway- see below). TBI also started a hate speech blog against former gay teachers from TBI at one point which described them performing various sexual acts on each other and referred to them by the most abusive terms which exist for gay people. (What kind of straight man dreams up sex fantasies involving former gay colleagues is beyond me, but TBI is VERY strange.) The whole thing was just surreally awful. This hideous blog lasted for several weeks and then it mysteriously disappeared, just like the hate campaign email addresses were shut down after the harassment had been done. They then publicly tried to blame another former teacher for the whole affair, which the former teacher vigorously denied.

In terms of gay or lesbian teachers, their information is actually false. To quote Wikipedia on the criminalization of homosexuality in Indonesia:

"The national criminal code does not prohibit cross-dressing or adult, non-commercial and consensual homosexual conduct between consenting adults, although it does contain a higher age of consent for same-sex sexual conduct."

They usually get their information wrong about most things. But you have to ask yourself if TBI (The British Institute) is now setting some kind of record as the most unethical TEFL institute in all Indonesia when it carries on in this way. Do they not know how normal schools conduct their affairs?

TBI Bekasi might be a disgrace but their sins do not end there. They seem to have no empathy at all and anyone who criticizes them at all is viewed as some kind of "public enemy" who has to be humiliated, bullied and intimidated in a very extreme way.


Last edited by bradleycooper on Sun Sep 08, 2013 7:59 am; edited 1 time in total
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plumpy nut



Joined: 12 Mar 2011
Posts: 1652

PostPosted: Sat Aug 31, 2013 8:30 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

It's just their culture. That's how they do things in Indonesia. What gives you an outsider to criticize them at all. Leave them be. Laughing

When I came to Indonesia to teach, I immediately decided why bother? I got a plane ticket and flew to Thailand.
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bradleycooper



Joined: 12 Apr 2013
Posts: 310

PostPosted: Sat Aug 31, 2013 9:53 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

plumpy nut wrote:
It's just their culture. That's how they do things in Indonesia. What gives you an outsider to criticize them at all. Leave them be. Laughing

When I came to Indonesia to teach, I immediately decided why bother? I got a plane ticket and flew to Thailand.


While the thieving and lying at TBI Bekasi has been done by an Indonesian citizen, a few "puppet" Westerners have made a niche for themselves at TBI being the Western face for local corruption. The supposed Head of Franchise from 2011 to 2012 was an expat, for instance. He was supposed to be monitoring the school but none of the teachers were ever contacted. He is just there for appearances' sake. He lacked either the will or the power to help the people who were conned at TBI Bekasi. (Most of the expat managers at TBI are using fake degrees to get visas themselves, so they are up to their eyeballs in the scams.)

It is also very clear that the hate emails against women who spoke out against TBI were written by expats. (Surely one of the two or three expat managers left in the whole chain). There were no grammar mistakes at all and there were a lot of colloquial insults and put-downs that I have never heard Indonesians use. I have marked thousands of papers from Indonesian students and even Advanced students do not write in that style, peppered with highly colloquial language. Some expats are very much part of the scams and lies at TBI.

On a positive note, we have been thanked by dozens of teachers over the past 2 years who thanked us for saving them from wasting a year at TBI. Due to the negative publicity, they have not been able to get enough legal teachers for 2 years now. They are well-known in Jakarta for being the "VKU visa scam school" and serious teachers stay clear.
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princesss



Joined: 28 Mar 2007
Posts: 152
Location: japan/indo/aust

PostPosted: Wed Sep 04, 2013 10:44 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

TBI is just a wolf in sheep's clothing. They have claimed many many victims over the years. But their dirty secrets are out. Their best days are well behind them.
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bradleycooper



Joined: 12 Apr 2013
Posts: 310

PostPosted: Thu Sep 05, 2013 8:04 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

When I worked at TBI Kelapa Gading, the school was a hot-bed of embezzlement. It had only been open 2 and a half years but both of the first 2 office managers ended up being fired for embezzlement.

I don't know how much the first office manager stole but I know that the second one embezzled Rp 150.00.000 over a 9 month period. Back then that worked out at around $16,000. I was told at this point that this was a "small" loss compared to how much the first office manager had stolen.

At the same time as this theft of student payments was going on, the school manager was also embezzling the marketing budget. (He had previously pulled the same trick at TBI Semarang, but he had merely been transferred not fired because he was related to the Head of Franchise.) The organisation recommended an alleged thief as a manager to one of their own franchisees! So both the school manager and the office manager were robbing the school at the same time. It was an unprofessional mad-house if I ever saw one.

For much of the first year and a half I worked there, the school admin was highly inefficient. The office manager was so busy cooking the books (so we later learned) that she had no time left to do her actual job, and things were very badly organised in the school. Furthermore, there was no money for promotions or marketing at all (due to all the lost revenue) and student numbers were at rock bottom as a result. EF Kelapa Gading had 600 students and we had a miserable 150-180. It amazes me that TBI claims that they are so much better than EF when their schools are not only full of tax evasion and other scams but mostly they have very low student numbers too.

"But we are the only CELTA trainer in Indonesia," they say, neglecting to mention that this only happens at 1 of their 17 schools. In my experience, Head Office kept promising that things would improve and asked for our patience but they are not sincere. They just want to get expats in, make some money off them and if they work out how bad TBI really is, they try and threaten and intimidate them into silence. They have no intention of ever being more than a con.
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BekasiWhistle



Joined: 19 Jul 2013
Posts: 23
Location: Bangkok

PostPosted: Thu Sep 12, 2013 1:45 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

TBI were informed about what the manager had been doing years ago but no one has been contacted back by TBI. They have not even had the decency to respond to our emails. That's why we know the head office is protecting this man.

I wasn't the only one who received death threats. My friend who was working there was dating a member of the Indonesian special forces. The school manager asked her if her boyfriend would be willing to do a hit on a former teacher who had stolen some of the school records. He said he could pay him 10 mill which is about $1000 if he killed the guy. He said that if he wasn't ready to kill him, maybe he would agree to rough him up. The teacher was terrified and never went back there again after that day. The manager of this school is dangerous and very scary. No joking.
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plumpy nut



Joined: 12 Mar 2011
Posts: 1652

PostPosted: Sat Sep 14, 2013 7:01 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

I don't have any experience teaching in Indonesia. I've only spent a month in Indonesia, two weeks in Jakarta, two in Yogya, one week in Bali. With what I've seen and mostly with what I have heard from people who have travelled from all the way from East to West over a period of years, this is totally plausible in a country like Indonesia. My experience with Immigration in Indonesia on just two occasions showed me just how sleazy and criminal the country is. My friend used to always have the Immigration authorities hit him up for $30 US every time he left and came back into the country during the year that he stayed there. On one occasion they wanted his bank card. He told them he would have to go to the consulate and tell them. They dropped the suggestion.
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bradleycooper



Joined: 12 Apr 2013
Posts: 310

PostPosted: Sun Sep 15, 2013 11:44 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

plumpy nut wrote:
With what I've seen and mostly with what I have heard from people who have travelled from all the way from East to West over a period of years, this is totally plausible in a country like Indonesia. My experience with Immigration in Indonesia on just two occasions showed me just how sleazy and criminal the country is. My friend used to always have the Immigration authorities hit him up for $30 US every time he left and came back into the country during the year that he stayed there. On one occasion they wanted his bank card. He told them he would have to go to the consulate and tell them. They dropped the suggestion.


Indonesia is a graft-ridden country which rates as one of Asia's most corrupt nations. There are currently a back-log of more than 2000 major corruption cases at the KPK (The Corruption Commission). Some of them involve tens of millions of dollars. The KPK recently seized $18 million from a single crooked police chief in Jakarta, for instance. Corruption is a scourge in Indonesia, and TBI is also controlled by some very questionable characters.

USG, the "charity" which owns TBI, actually has Abdurizal Bakrie on its board. Bakrie is the leader of GOLKAR, the party of tycoons which was founded by the former military dictator, Suharto. Bakrie, whose wealth comes mostly from coal-mining, has been a highly controversial figure who has faced frequent allegations of tax evasion through various fronts. The taint of suspected corruption around the man is so strong that there is pressure for his own party to replace him with someone more electable before the 2014 elections. He is polling in single digits despite being in charge of the 2nd biggest party. Google "Bakrie and Gayus" online and you will quickly get some idea of how much he has been accused of tax evasion.

From what we know, TBI seems to be heavily tied in with coal-mining and palm-oil mafias. TBI Kelapa Gading, for example, is linked with PT. Teladan Prima which has been accused of clearing orangutan habitat in Borneo. When I worked at that school we never received tax slips at all and the school only accepted cash student payments as late as 2012. What kind of $200,000 a year business does not accept payments by card? Basically, we know for a fact that TBI is engaged in large-scale tax avoidance at multiple branches. This is a business system which would be very appealing to someone like the manager of TBI Bekasi.
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BekasiWhistle



Joined: 19 Jul 2013
Posts: 23
Location: Bangkok

PostPosted: Wed Sep 18, 2013 2:17 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I know 6 teachers who worked at TBI Bekasi. Every single one of us got the same degrading threats, the same lies that led to more lies. My friend who I still keep in touch with worked for 3 months for nothing at this school.

The manager who is also the part owner only paid him 6 mill a month even though he was promised 9 mill at first. The school owner had his passport and he said he would back-pay him once business picked up. He lied to him that he was processing his work visa. Actualy the passport was never put in. After 3 months the owner told him if that if he didn't work all year for 6 mill he would report him to Immigration for overstaying his tourist visa. The teacher eventually got his passport back because he had some connected friends but by then he had overstayed his tourist visa so long he had to pay 18 mill in fines to get out of the situation. He literally made nothing out of 3 months working there.
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bradleycooper



Joined: 12 Apr 2013
Posts: 310

PostPosted: Thu Sep 19, 2013 6:55 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

BekasiWhistle wrote:
I know 6 teachers who worked at TBI Bekasi. Every single one of us got the same degrading threats, the same lies that led to more lies. My friend who I still keep in touch with worked for 3 months for nothing at this school.


These statements strongly suggest that Head Office knew about the teacher abuse and deliberately turned a blind eye. Let me explain why.

I also worked at a TBI franchise school and I know a lot about how the system is supposed to work. Once a year they do a whole-day audit at each of the franchise schools. Apart from this one day, you won't hear from Head Office much at all. Part of the audit process is that the auditor from Head Office has to interview at least a couple of teachers from the school to get their feedback. They also have to watch at least one lesson to see how the quality is. One day a year is a bare minimum of supervision, perhaps, but at least it was something. My question is, why did none of the 6 teachers at TBI Bekasi who worked there between 2008-2012 ever get interviewed? How could the audit process have not happened at all 5 years running? I certainly know the auditors always turned once a year at TBI Kelapa Gading and the former TBI Semarang. (Now bankrupt). Hmmm.

Basically, I don't buy that it was an accident. It's not possible that they just "overlooked" the audit 5 years in a row. There is, of course, a much more likely explanation. Some of the teachers had contacted Head Office by email and told them what was going on. (Head Office never replied, but the email addresses were correct.) The reason they didn't audit the school and interview teachers was clearly because they didn't want to take responsibility. If they had asked questions and talked to teachers, it would have been on the record. It seems patently clear to me that they deliberately turned a blind eye. Death threats and unpaid salaries? Investigating those kind of claims could be problematic! So they have simply thrown these teachers to the wolves and let TBI Bekasi's manager con victim after victim for years.
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