Training fee clawback

[Bonbonn]

I intend on resigning from my current job but am hesitant due to there being potentially large fees to pay on leaving. I'm in an ACA training contract currently and finished my last exam November 2018.

My training contract states that my current firm can "recover all or part of the study fees if I leave employment within two years of them incurring the costs".

My initials interpretation of this is that they can recover everything in the last two years (so back to September 2018, as intended leave date is September 2020). My concern is they will interpret this as recover all costs incurred for the ACA exams (started these September 2016).

Would they be able to recover the entire cost? I would only be 2 months away from being completely free (the offer I have is very good and I really don't want to pass it up). The difference in costs is £17k total and £5k in the last two years.

From the reading I've done it seems like my current firm would have a hard time justifying recovery of £17k based on there being no attempt to estimate losses incurred by them of I leave (I.e do they really expect those two extra months to recover the total fee). But I'm worried and curious for people's thoughts on how this will/should be interpreted.
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[ULA]

Happy to provide some advice on this but can you please post up the complete clause and also any clauses that related to a sliding scale of repayment the longer the period from when the training was completed.

Please make sure you anonymise any details.*

[Bonbonn]

"On completion of your training contract*XXXX will require repayment of all or part of your study fees including course fees, material costs, exam fees and subscription costs if you leave within two years of us incurring the costs." Is the exact clause word for word with anonymised name. No more is said on this. No sliding scale, absolutely nothing.

Any help would be much appreciated.

[ULA]

Thank you for posting up the clause in full. It seems pretty clear that if you completed your exams and therefore the course in Nov 2018 then if you leave before Nov 2020 you will required to repay all or part of your study fees.*

I would suggest though that given they have had the benefit of your new skills since Nov 2018 then the amount to repay should be a proportion of the original cost. Most training clawback agreement do have a sliding scale of repayment set out and although this is not the case in your situation I would suggest that you refer to the "or part" as being applicable.*

[Bonbonn]

Thanks for the advice. As the exams are completed in stages (15 across the two years relatively evenly split) do you know if the benefit accrued is arguable to start throughout the course or does it tend to be interpreted on completion of the course? I.e. would it be weird if I was paying back 50% of fees incurred in September 2016 and 50% of fees incurred in November 2018?

[ULA]

Generally the benefit starts from completion of the course. But as I have said most training agreement have a sliding scale over that period requirement to remain with the company.

So you could argue that if the full costs of the course were 17k divided by 24 months x 22 months since you finished the course and leave equals £15,583.33 as the benefit to the company. The repayment could therefore be considered as the outstanding amount.

Just my thoughts on how the sliding scale could work.