I worked there for barely a month, I was desperate and awaiting a visa to be ready for a different country. I'm going to be honest, my attitude there stank because I just didn't care. That was my fault and my problem and I shouldn't have acted that way.

When ever I tried to have passion, it was knocked back by how obviously fake Feruz's attitude is; he is the fakest so called manager I've ever had the displeasure of meeting. His 'partner' Aaron was never seen nor heard from once I arrived in Uzbekistan.

Without sounding paranoid, the apartment I was in was almost certainly visited while I wasn't home. When I became suspicious, I hid my camera and sure enough after a few days a lady came into the apartment and went through all of my things. I also found it odd that Feruz was able to quote things I had apparently said, however they weren't things I had said in front of him.

Feruz assumes that every foreigner is an alcoholic and makes endless comments about drinking too much. I assume this stems from previous issues with alcoholic teachers but it does get rather tiresome.

One day, there was a gas leak in my apartment and it knocked me out. If I hadn't have slept with my window open, I'd have been dead. Feruz didn't care at all and it took days to resolve. No offer was made to have me checked out by a doctor.

I was fired, and I understand why. However, rather than be honest Feruz made up some lie about there being financial issues with the company but, even before I had left, he emailed my friend and asked him to come to Uzbekistan because of my 'unprofessional conduct'. He's a liar and a coward of the highest order.

Tashkent is a strange place but Uzbek people are lovely. The other teachers at the school were kind too, the only problem was Feruz.

If you want a job where you'll be respected and where you don't expect your boss to spy on you then don't work at Prime Coach.

greg was wondering if could talk about your experience via email? Looking into Prime Coach

Thank you so much for your candid assessment of Prime Coach. My wife and I were both going to apply to the ad on SeriousTeachers.com, but after reading this we certainly have second thoughts. It sounds like a nightmare. It just goes to show how careful one must be. We had nothing but good experiences teaching abroad, so we had our guard down. You alerted us to be careful for there are bad guys even in this industry. Thanks again!

You ignore the fact that Prime Coach is just a training centre and not a reputable school, and that working for training centres is a job at the bottom of the barrel without any repute for your future work history - whether in Tashkent, somewhere in China, or back home in the UK, or on planet Jupiter!

You seem to have a really big chip on your shoulder and I'm not sure why. Except for the shared accommodation, none of what you say rings true.
And only 12 classroom hours a week? Sounds like you don't like teaching very much.

I work at Prime Coach and it's a good place to work. We get paid 1.8 million soms -- about $900, but worth more on the black market. Tashkent is essentially a Russian speaking city (although there are a hundred nationalities living here), so people have a lot of common sense and practical wisdom. Add to that the open-heartedness of the Uzbekis and you have students who are a pleasure to teach. If anyone wants to live somewhere that is both third world and modern, consider Tashkent. If you would like to work at a school with western standards of management, consider working at Prime Coach.

I have not worked for this company, only interacted with them by email, but the way they represented themselves was alarming enough that I feel obligated to warn other ESL teachers. Dr. Kamilov, owner and DOS, solicited me, writing to offer me a position at his school, which is primarily an IELTS training center, with some General English courses. The details of the contract were not acceptable to me, but I am interested in Uzbekistan, so I wrote with a counter-offer. For example, he offered me the equivalent of $650/mo, but I think that having an M.Ed., a TEFL certificate, and 17 years of teaching experience makes me worth more, so I asked for $800. He said that the number of hours taught per week did not matter, but I said that it must be written into the contract. I currently teach 24 45-minute hours. Prime Coach's lessons are 90 minutes, so I suggested 12 teaching hours/week. He stated that the accommodation would be shared, but I am not wiling to live in shared housing, so I mentioned that. I also told him that the grammar and word choices in his email were poor, and asked why he didn't ask one of his native speaking teachers to proofread it. I invited him to respond if he was interested in negotiating, but otherwise wished him luck in his search for teachers.

His response was to tell me that it was *his* company, and I would do everything *his* way. Period. He also told me that until I could write in his native language as well as he could write in mine, I was not allowed to criticize his grammar. Remember that he wrote to me first and there was no signed contract between us!

While nothing he wrote is incorrect, his attitude is very scary. A contract negotiation is just that, and there is no excuse for abusing someone who counters an offer. You can ignore it or reject it, but pulling the kind of power trip Dr. Kamilov did is way out of line. I was trying both to be helpful in pointing out a badly written letter and trying to see if there were actually native speakers on site, but Dr. Kamilov showed an attitude that would be detrimental to English teaching. How would students ever improve if foreign teachers couldn't correct them?

If you doubt my veracity, google the centre and look at the web site. You'll find it riddled with errors, indicating that no native speaker of English has ever worked there. Just delete any email you receive from Prime Coach or Dr. Kamilov.