Brandon, I bet there are many out there that'll appreciate your post. Had I not had enough experience from before, I probably would've gotten f*cked by this school myself half a year ago. A local FAO that works in the area and that I know well has suggested the employer and I have contacted him as well as visited the school. After visiting it, I could smell a rat, and not only the ones in their AC units. It's a filthy language mill that's run by even filthier owner. However, I've got one nice experience from the school and that is their driver. He was so nice to pick me up and drop me of at the bus station and with a smile on his face. If that driver managed the school, I possibly would have agreed to work for them. :)
Cheers and beers to the local employers :LOL

Lingdong School in Foshan China, a 10 month mistake, a lifetime of regret!

My name is Brandon Neth, if you have any questions/other concerns feel free to contact me at bneth923@msn.com
Also note, I was one of a group of four that had the same experience. This is not an isolated incident and I truly believe it will happen to each and every foreign teacher that steps foot through the door at this place.

After working for Lingdong school from September 1st 2009-July 5th 2010 (10 month contract), I truly regret accepting a position with this school. While writing this review I didn't know where to start. There were so many problems and issues that seemed to worsen as time progressed, I believe simply making a list is the best approach.

These are in no specific order:

You must pay a 4000-5000rmb deposit over your first 6 months with the company (I believe collecting this is illegal) which you are supposed to receive back on the last day of your contract. Then, when that day came, they wouldn't return mine!!
Upon completion of my contract, I DID NOT receive my bonus, flight reimbursement or "deposit" mentioned above. After speaking and meeting with the school, I was told repeatedly "it's not my problem" by the school's owner (through his translator) and was never paid. I was shocked that the school would deny me this money considering that I was NEVER late in my 10 months, I had perfect reviews from all my students and I never missed a class even when I was sick.
The management or lack there of is a JOKE!
The campuses are filthy!
The living conditions are a joke, they do NOT provide the type of accommodation outlined in your contract.
The "headmaster" (Brian Qin) speaks NO English and uses his 21 year old son (Nick Qin) to translate (sort of), whom has NO business sense and has a horrible attitude.
The campus managers (Angela and Margaret) are dishonest, incompetent, and dis-loyal to both the Foreign staff and the Chinese staff.
The school treats the Chinese staff horribly and constantly lies to them.
The contract literally means nothing, if you try to use it to verify something the school says it doesnt matter.
If you threaten to contact the police/an attorney the school will tell you to your face that they will "pay them off".

The list goes on and on, as mentioned above I am more than willing to give MANY more details to any one interested, however
Please, please, please stay away for your own good.

When was that ? I hardly ever saw him and I don't think I ever spoke to him I only saw him when he came to pick up the money.

hey, I was there long enough to know not to stay any longer. did you work there you seem to know quite a bit about the school.
Yea the owner hasn't got a clue. Glad to be rid of the place, who is the person in Nanhai you talk to I heard the Chinese manager out there was a bit of a fool too she never listened to advice and terrorized the staff out there,also heard that the housing facilities out there are terrible !!!!!!!!!!

Thank you for letting me know about this thread. It would seem that a few teachers have found Lingdong a terrible place to work !!!!!!!!

Lingdong according to their website "Lingdong" means Flexibility and it sure does.
1.They are flexible with the contract that you sign changing it without warning or explanation.
2.Flexible with the truth.
3.Flexible with pay and when you get paid and what months you get full pay.
4.Flexible with the hours you work and what work you do.
Pretty much flexible with whatever the school whats but when it comes to being flexible for the staff then the flexibility stops.
I will give you some examples of how unprofessional this and I use the term loosely "Training center" is

1. you will receive a contract that has what you think everything the school expects from you and all you need to know and with think that the school will keep its end of the contract so you sign it and set of for China when you arrive you are give a set of "policies" that you have never see stating if you miss a class you will be fined double pay, if you are late for class you are fined hours pay and many more ridicules "policies" you have never seen because they know you would never agree to them in the first place but what can you do you are there now.During the course of you year contract the school changes the contract you signed with out explanation and consolation taking things away just because the owner wants to and you are told this that it is final because he says so. So teachers are told they will get the relevant work visas when they get to China only to be told by the school that they can't get it and you will have to work illegal and in some cases you even have to pay for your visas and never get reimbursed. These are just some of the things that happened while I worked there and there were many more.

2. The truth is not a concept that Lingdong Management know as 90% of what they tell you is not true !!!!!!!!! They will lie to your face about everything and the mouthpiece for the school is a Chinese guy with very poor English and he is so easy to catch in the lie sometimes its funny or sometimes there are 2-3 people tell you different stories regrading the same thing. Now that is bad enough and very frustrating if you are in the middle but even worse is when the school asks other teachers to lie to fellow teachers for example the school gave some teachers mobile phones and when the other teachers asked where their phones were the school asked the teachers with the phone to say the school didn't give them the phones. Also a teachers was asked to move out of her apartment as the owner was selling it but instead moved another teacher in and asked him no to tell the teacher that moved out. The worse case I thing was when the school asked a Chinese member of staff phone the parents of a teacher they didn't want to resign and lie to them stating that the teacher was working in another school when he wasn't just to give LIngdong a valid reason not to resign him. These are just some examples I know of I am sure there are many more.

3.In the contract it states that you will be paid x amount every month unless the month is not a full paid month and then it will be paid per/ hour which is fair, but what they don't tell you is which month are full paid and which are not. My first year there there were two months that were not full pay when I left it was four. Also it states that you will be paid between x day and y day and when I worked there it was 3 days between the 1-3 of every month my last year there 4 out of 12 months we didn't get paid on time and were never given an explanation and the owner was always back in his hometown ???

4.In the contract it states that you will work 100 hours a month with 4-5 being for promotion work some months you will work 10-15 hour promotion.
The school if they don't have enough classes will make you come in and just sit in the office and "do interviews" which is do nothing

On the whole I have never worked in such a disorganized and unprofessional company in my life.
The top management have no management skills what so ever and the decline of the school is proof of that it has just go worse and the student number are down.
I would urge anyone who is thinking of working at Lingdong School in Foshan to think again and not to believe anything they say. There are plenty of good schools out here but they are not one of them

Hey I couldn't agree with you more. The rats are the least of the problems there. The manager in Nanhai is terrible her managment style or lack there of and her lack of English was frustrating and comical !!!! But the other managers are not much better like the one who was in charge of "life issues" couldn't understand a word of what he said. The stories the school told too were entertaining how they tried to minipulate the contract after you sign it.
They do cut corners and pay if the can just so the big boss can make a buck or two.
THE PLACE IS TERRIBLE STAY AWAY !!!!!

Jason, beep a dead rat in the air con. This school is sh*t for many other much more valid reasons than that. The school has copied the western adult and kids books and then put its own cover on it, selling these books as its own product. The school in Nanhai (there are at least two campuses) has got some "foreign academi manager" that uses English just like an intermediate student of the language. The school's owner discriminates against certain racial as well as age groups, and never mind his sexist approach to employment at his centers as this is a fairly common characteristic amongst the Chinese male employers. Most importantly, however, the Lingdong company is run by a clueless individual that thinks he can make a buck out of his connections only.

Cheers and beers to the esl teachers board that allows us to share our knowledge and experiences on