By making a booking on this site, you agree to the terms and conditions hereby stated.

In these terms and conditions, PM is Practical Mandarin, the trading name of City Mandarin Limited (Company No. 9986908).

Class Type

PM offers 4 types of group classes and private tutoring (1-2 students) to students at all levels.

Group classes

Regular Weekly Class is for lessons running once a week either on weekday evenings (Monday to Thursday) from 6:30pm to 8:30pm, or on Saturdays for a 2 hours time slot between 10:00am to 6:00pm, for a period of 10 to 12 weeks.

Intensive Class is for lessons running twice a week, either on weekdays evenings (Monday to Thursday) from 6.30pm to 8.30 pm, and/or on Saturdays between 10:00am to 6:00pm, for a period of 5 to 6 weeks.

Semi-Intensive Class is for lessons running twice a week for 3 weeks, then once a week for 6 weeks, either on weekdays evenings (Monday to Thursday) from 6.30pm to 8.30 pm, and/or on Saturdays for a 4 hours time slot between 10:00am to 6:00pm, for a total period of 9 weeks.

Corporate Group Class is for lessons provided exclusively to our clients at their company premises.

Private Tutoring

Private Tutoring is for lessons provided exclusively to 1 or 2 maximum students at our premises or other premises agreed with clients.

Class Time Table

All PM courses are advertised with scheduled start and finish dates within specific hours. Each course booking is only valid for the specified dates and times, and is not transferable to other courses at different dates and times, unless previously agreed by PM.

PM reserves the right not to run an advertised course at the scheduled start date and time if there are fewer than 4 students enrolled for that course. Wherever possible, an alternative course or a later start date will be offered to the students; if this is not possible or suitable to the students, a full refund will be arranged.

Tuition Fees

PM tuition fees must be paid in full in advance before a scheduled starting date.

Entry Beginner – Prepaid Booking

All Entry Beginner courses are only available to attend with a prepaid booking. the Entry Beginner tuition fee must be paid in full to PM prior to an Entry Beginner course start date to confirm a successful booking. There is no trial lesson available for Entry Beginner courses; instead PM’s Satisfaction Guarantee is offered to all Entry Beginner students for refund options. Please see below for details.

Other Group Classes – Trial Lessons

Trial lessons are available to students interested joining PM’s courses higher than Entry Beginner.  Students must contact PM separately to prepay for 1 (or 2) lessons of a PM Group course.  A student will then be able to attend 1 (or 2) lessons of a currently running group course to enable a student to assess whether the group course is suitable for them.

Private Tutoring

Private Tutoring must be booked and paid for in advance in a minimum block of 6 lessons (or as individually agreed with students).  Each private tutoring session is a minimum of 1.5 hours to 2 hours.  Please contact PM directly about arranging private trial lessons.

Satisfaction Guarantee Policy

PM offers all students its Satisfaction Guarantee policy to protect your pre-paid booking with PM. After attending the first lesson of the booked course, students will have 7 days to contact PM directly (via email / phone) to apply for a full refund of the remaining tuition fee, if for whatever reason, the course has not lived up to the student’s satisfaction.

Refund & Cancellation Policy

All PM tuition fees are non-refundable except in the following circumstances:

• PM cancels a scheduled group course or private tutor session;
• PM’s Satisfaction Guarantee applies; or a
• Force Majeure event occurs.

A Force Majeure event is an event or circumstances beyond PM’s control; such an event or circumstance may include (but is not limited to) any of the following: an act of terrorism, war, riot, strikes, Act of God or an outbreak of an infectious and communicable disease.  If a Force Majeure event occurs, and becomes necessary to close PM for a limited period, PM cannot accept responsibility for any loss that may be incurred by students through the loss of classes.

If, due to unforeseen circumstances, a tutor assigned to a group course or private tutoring course becomes unavailable, PM reserves the right to change the tutor for the remaining group course or private tutoring lessons. If a student would like to withdraw from that course for that reason, PM will offer a good will 10% refund of the remaining tuition fees.

For Private Tutoring, PM offers flexible scheduling and students are able to make appointments with tutors independently; however, a 24 hours cancellation policy applies to Private Tutoring.  Once an appointment has been agreed between a tutor and student, any date or time change to that scheduled lesson time must be agreed with at least 24 hours notice. Lessons cancelled or postponed with less than 24 hours notice will be charged at full rate.

Private Tutoring block bookings have a designated expiry date on each invoice. If there are any remaining lessons that have not occurred before the expiry date, these lessons will not be refunded, and PM has the right not to fulfil these lessons.

Unpaid or Late Payment Penalty

If a student begins attending a PM course without having made a prepaid booking, or does not make payment before the course start date, a late payment penalty will be charged to the student.  If payment of the tuition fee has not been received by PM within 4 weeks of the course start date, 5% of the tuition fees will be charged to the student, in addition to the due tuition fee.  If payment of the tuition fees has not been received by PM within 8 weeks of the course start date, 10% of the tuition fees will be charged to the student, in addition to the due tuition fee.

Course Transfer

Up to 7 days before a group course starts, a student may change their group booking to another date without incurring an administration fee. Students must contact PM directly to arrange this. After a course starts, any course transfer requests will be considered on an individual basis, a minimum transfer fee of 20% of the tuition will be charged if a successful transfer can be arranged.

Attendance & Making Up Missed Lessons

Attendance to all lessons is the students’ own responsibility.  PM cannot make any reduction on tuition fees if a student cannot or fails to attend all lessons of a booked course. Any untaken lessons by the student is not refundable and/or transferrable to credits for future course bookings.

However, PM reserves the right to offer a deduction on tuition fees if a student has pre-booked holidays before enrolling on a group course.  Any fee reduction is offered on an individual basis, but will be no more than 20% of the total tuition fees.  Any student who wishes to apply for a deduction must contact PM directly before enrolling on a group course.

To help students attend all lessons, PM offers the below options of making up missed lessons. Students can choose to:

• attend another group class at a date and time given by PM; or
• arrange a make-up private lesson at a discounted rate; or
• use PM’s free class teaching material, recorded audio lessons for review

Students should contact PM directly about making up missed lessons. 

Please note: only TWO free make-up lessons will be offered per course, any further requests will be charged at £15 per make-up lesson.

Term Time & Public Holidays

New Beginner courses are available on a monthly basis.

Higher level courses are available on 4 terms per year basis:

• New year term intake starts in January;
• Spring term intake starts in April;
• Summer term intake starts in July;
• Autumn term intake starts in September

Private Tutoring may be arranged at any time of the year.

On Public Holidays, PM’s classes are usually not taught, unless otherwise agreed in advance between students and their teachers.