As glad as Wu Cheng was to get a 2,000 yuan (HK$2,270) refund from the Guangzhou Haojin Vocational School, where he had sent his 15-year-old son to be cured of his internet addiction, he was even happier to get his boy out before the treatment got any worse.
Mr Wu had stood in the hot summer sun for two days outside the closed campus after realising that the camp - which he initially thought was the best way to cure his son's addiction - was using methods akin to torture.
'If I had known my son would be beaten there, it would have been so stupid for me to pay money for that,' he said.
Parents across the mainland are spending billions of yuan to send their children to newly established treatment centres, which claim to be able to cure internet addiction.
But monitoring the methods of treatment has become a tricky question for parents, the authorities and experts from education, health, legal and other fields.
Mr Wu, in his mid-40s, said his son had spent five to six hours a day playing games in internet cafes. He sent his son to the camp late last month for isolation.