Business Closure and Teach-Out Policy
Purpose
Tandem Coaching Academy is the coach education division of Tandem Coaching Partners, LLC (“Tandem”). This policy explains what Tandem will do for enrolled learners if Tandem closes, discontinues a program, or can no longer deliver education it has sold. It covers how learners will be told, how they can finish their education, what happens to their records, and how money for undelivered education is handled.
In this policy, a learner is the person enrolled in the education (the Participant in Tandem’s Additional Terms and Conditions). The purchaser is the person or organization that paid, such as an employer. When they are different people, Tandem writes to both.
The policy applies to every education offering Tandem sells, including programs accredited by the International Coaching Federation (ICF). It uses the same four offering types as Tandem’s Additional Terms and Conditions:
- Live Program: Instructor-led cohorts and modules: ICF Level 1 and Level 2 coach training, team coaching, mentor coach training, and coaching supervision training
- Scheduled Service: Mentor coaching packages, group and individual mentoring, supervision sessions, and recording reviews
- Self-Paced Digital Course: On-demand courses, including Continuing Coach Education courses
- Practitioner Series All-Access: The annual Practitioner Series membership
This policy adds to the Additional Terms and Conditions. Where this policy gives a learner a better option during a closure, this policy applies.
Our Commitment
Tandem’s first goal in any closure is that every learner who has started a program can finish it. Tandem will stop enrolling new learners in an affected program as soon as a closure decision is made, and will use the time and money that remain to complete the education already sold. When that is not possible, Tandem will help the learner finish elsewhere, give them a full record of what they completed, and refund the part of their purchase that was not delivered.
Tandem cannot promise that every learner will be able to finish every program with Tandem. It will act in good faith, put enrolled learners first, and keep them informed at every step.
When This Policy Applies
This policy applies when Tandem decides, or is forced, to:
- close the business;
- permanently discontinue a program or offering;
- suspend a program with no confirmed date to resume; or
- give up or lose ICF accreditation for a program while learners are enrolled in it.
Causes may include, among others: voluntary closure; financial hardship or insolvency; the death, disability, or long-term incapacity of a Tandem leader or lead faculty member; the loss of faculty, staff, or systems needed to teach; regulatory, accreditation, or legal changes; and events outside Tandem’s control, such as natural disaster, war, pandemic, or a long-term platform failure.
Ordinary changes are not closures. A rescheduled class, a qualified substitute facilitator, a curriculum update, or a move to a new learning platform is handled under the Additional Terms and Conditions, not this policy.
Continuity comes first. Tandem’s programs are led by two Master Certified Coaches (MCC) and taught with additional contracted faculty and mentor coaches. If one educator becomes unavailable, Tandem’s first response is to assign a qualified substitute so the program continues. Tandem’s Chief Executive Officer and Managing Director decide on a closure only when a program cannot reasonably continue.
Telling Learners
When Tandem decides to close or discontinue a program, it will:
- Stop new enrollments in the affected program the same day.
- Write to every enrolled learner, and to the purchaser if different, within five Business Days of the decision. Notices go by email to the address on file and are also posted in the learning platform.
- Tell faculty and contracted mentor coaches within the same five Business Days.
- Notify ICF Coaching Education within ten Business Days of the decision when an ICF-accredited program is affected.
- Give at least 30 days’ written notice before the closure takes effect. In an emergency, shorter notice may be unavoidable; Tandem will then give notice as soon as it can.
- Send an update at least every 30 days during the teach-out, and whenever an option or deadline changes.
The written notice will include:
- the effective date of the closure or discontinuation;
- the learner’s progress so far: hours, modules, mentor coaching, and assessments completed;
- the requirements that remain;
- the teach-out options open to that learner, and the deadline to choose one, which will be at least 14 calendar days after the notice;
- refund options, if any, and how they are calculated;
- the date the learning platform will close, and how to download materials and request records before then;
- who to contact with questions.
A Business Day is Monday through Friday, excluding United States federal holidays, as defined in the Additional Terms and Conditions.
Teach-Out Options
Tandem will offer one or more of the following options, in this order of preference.
1. Finish with Tandem
Tandem will keep operating long enough to complete every cohort and module already in progress on the date of the closure decision. Learners complete their remaining classes, mentor coaching, observed sessions, assignments, and assessments on the published schedule or a revised one. Tandem keeps grading work and issuing certificates until the teach-out ends.
Learners who hold a right to attend a future cohort, for example after a deferral, will be told which cohorts remain and offered a seat where one is available before the closure date.
2. Substitute faculty
If a scheduled educator cannot teach, Tandem will appoint a qualified replacement instructor, mentor coach, supervisor, or assessor. Each replacement will meet the qualifications ICF requires for that role in that program.
3. Continued access and self-paced completion
Learners keep access to course materials, recordings, and assignments for at least 90 days after the last scheduled live session of the teach-out, so they can finish outstanding self-paced work. If Tandem cannot keep the learning platform open that long, it will give learners a reasonable chance to download eligible materials before access ends.
4. Transfer to another provider
If Tandem cannot complete a learner’s program, it will identify at least one other ICF-accredited provider with a comparable program and, with the learner’s written consent, send that provider the learner’s records. The receiving provider decides what prior learning it accepts and sets its own enrollment, tuition, attendance, and completion rules. Tandem cannot guarantee that another provider will accept a transfer or credit completed hours.
5. Refund of the undelivered portion
If no teach-out option is reasonably available to a learner, Tandem will refund the part of the purchase price allocated to the education not delivered, as described under Refunds and Money.
How each offering type is handled
- Live Program: Cohorts in progress are completed with Tandem or substitute faculty. If that is not possible: transfer support, a progress record, and a refund of the undelivered portion.
- Scheduled Service: Remaining sessions are delivered before the closure date, with a substitute qualified mentor coach or supervisor if needed. Sessions Tandem cannot deliver are refunded.
- Self-Paced Digital Course: At least 30 days’ notice before access ends, a chance to download eligible materials, and a certificate for every course completed before access ends.
- Practitioner Series All-Access: Renewals stop at once and no further charges are taken. Access continues until the closure date, and the unused part of any paid annual term is refunded.
Learner Records
What Tandem keeps
- enrollment and order records;
- attendance at live sessions;
- payments, refunds, and installment records;
- course, module, and program completion;
- mentor coaching and coaching supervision logs: dates, hours, group or individual format, and the mentor coach or supervisor;
- assessments, evaluation forms, and written feedback;
- certificates of completion, progress records, and Continuing Coach Education certificates.
Coaching recordings and transcripts that learners submit for assessment are not kept as part of the long-term record, because they contain coaching clients’ confidential information. Before the learning platform closes, learners may request copies of their own submissions. Tandem then deletes the recordings and transcripts and keeps the evaluation forms and feedback.
How long
Tandem keeps learner records for at least seven years after the closure date, or longer if the law requires.
Before closure
Before the learning platform closes, every learner receives by email a PDF copy of each certificate they earned and a progress record (described below). Learners can request anything else in their record by writing to hello@tandemcoach.co before the closure date.
After closure
Tandem’s Managing Director acts as records custodian. If the Managing Director is unable to, Tandem’s Chief Executive Officer takes on the role. If neither is able, Tandem’s legal representative will appoint a custodian or transfer the records to a successor organization. The closure notice names the custodian and gives a contact address that will keep working after closure. Tandem also gives the custodian’s details to ICF.
The custodian provides learners with copies of their own records on request, free of charge, for the full retention period. Records go to anyone else, including another provider, only with the learner’s written consent, when ICF needs them to verify a credential application, or when the law requires. Records are stored electronically, with access limited to the people who need it, and Tandem’s Privacy Policy continues to apply.
Certificates and Progress Records
Learners who complete all requirements before the closure date, or through a teach-out, receive Tandem’s standard certificate of completion.
Learners who do not finish receive a progress record showing:
- courses and modules completed;
- contact hours completed, split into live and self-paced hours;
- mentor coaching and supervision hours completed, with dates and the credential of the mentor coach or supervisor;
- assignments and assessments completed, with results;
- requirements that remain, where known.
The progress record shows only work Tandem verified. It is not a certificate of full completion, and another provider or ICF decides how to use it. As ICF recommends, learners should also keep their own copies of certificates, mentor coaching forms, and feedback.
Refunds and Money
If Tandem cannot deliver education a learner paid for and cannot offer a reasonable teach-out, it refunds the part of the price reasonably allocated to the education not delivered. The Additional Terms and Conditions already commit Tandem to this, including when a closure results from events outside Tandem’s control.
Refunds are calculated as follows:
- Live Program: the share of the program’s scheduled hours not delivered. For a program bought module by module, the modules not delivered.
- Scheduled Service: the per-session price of each session not delivered.
- Practitioner Series All-Access: the unused days of the paid annual term.
- Self-Paced Digital Course: the course is delivered at purchase, so Tandem gives notice and a download opportunity instead of a refund, as the Additional Terms and Conditions describe.
In addition:
- Tandem deducts no administrative fee from a teach-out refund.
- Unpaid installments for education that will not be delivered are cancelled. Tandem takes no further payment for education it will not deliver.
- Refunds go to the purchaser by the original payment method. Tandem starts each approved refund within three Business Days.
- Tandem does not pay fees charged by a receiving provider unless it agrees to in writing.
Tandem’s accounting holds tuition for training not yet delivered in a training reserve and moves it to income only as the training is delivered. This means Tandem can see at any time how much tuition relates to education it still owes enrolled learners.
If Tandem enters a formal insolvency proceeding, refunds will be handled under that process and applicable law.
What Learners Need to Do
Learners are asked to:
- keep their email address current and read teach-out messages;
- tell Tandem which option they choose by the deadline in the notice;
- finish remaining work by the teach-out deadlines;
- download materials and request records before the learning platform closes;
- keep their own copies of certificates and mentor coaching records;
- work directly with a receiving provider if they transfer, and pay that provider’s fees unless Tandem agrees otherwise in writing.
If a learner does not respond by the deadline, Tandem keeps them in the “finish with Tandem” option where one exists and still sends their certificates and progress record. A missed deadline may limit what else Tandem can do.
Who Comes First
Learners who are actively enrolled and in good standing when the closure decision is made come first. Learners who hold a right to attend a future cohort come next, as seats allow. Tandem may not be able to offer teach-out options to former learners, learners who withdrew, or learners whose enrollment period has ended, unless a written agreement or the law requires it. Every learner, current or former, can still request their records for the full retention period.
Staff and Faculty
- The Managing Director owns this policy, reviews it every year and at each ICF accreditation renewal, and leads any closure.
- Faculty, mentor coaches, and staff receive this policy when they join and whenever it changes.
- Faculty, mentor coaches, and staff are expected to cooperate with a teach-out, including finishing scheduled sessions or promptly handing their learner records to Tandem.
- Faculty record mentor coaching hours, supervision hours, attendance, and assessments in Tandem’s systems, not only in personal files, so records survive any one person’s departure.
Where This Policy Is Published
This policy is published at tandemcoach.co/business-closure-teach-out-policy/ and linked from the Additional Terms and Conditions. A copy is available on request from hello@tandemcoach.co.
Contact
Tandem Coaching Partners, LLC (Tandem Coaching Academy)
104 E Ovilla Rd, Red Oak, TX 75154-1278
hello@tandemcoach.co · 1-855-51-COACH
Revision History
- Version 1.0: First issue, written to meet ICF Accreditation Standard 2 (Business Closure and Teach-Out)
- Version 1.1: Contact address changed to Tandem’s published address, 104 E Ovilla Rd