By Sugeeswara Senadhira/Daily News
Sydney, December 6: Australian universities have acknowledged that AUS$ 147 million has been paid to education agents for recruiting foreign students last year and most of the agencies have not disclosed to students and parents that they get payments from the universities, and charge a huge fee from students.
It became evident that education agents are pocketing record commission fees from some top New South Wales (NSW) universities which have become increasingly reliant on the brokers in a highly competitive international student market.
The universities in NSW spent at least AUS$ 147 million on the commissions last year, but students are largely in the dark on the portion of their tuition fees that go to the agents, prompting calls for regulation and transparency in the growing sector.
Some agents collect university fees from students, but they do not pay the full fee to the universities. Sri Lankan student Aroshan Wijesinghe said he paid the fees to an agent in Panadura, but to his dismay the university told him that only the fee for first term was paid by the agent. Aroshan did not have any option other than to work part time to earn for student fees.
About 76 percent of 2022 international student enrolments at universities came to Australia through education agents, according to the latest federal government data, up from 61 percent 10 years ago.
There are thousands of education agents working in Australia and offshore, but it is largely up to universities and other education providers to monitor and regulate them.
Misleading Students
Education Correspondent of the Sydney Morning Herald, Daniella White said in an article that some students have reported to being misled by unscrupulous agents who don’t disclose their high commissions and push students into courses they may not be suited to, or provide deceptive migration advice.
She quoted, Weihong Liang, a Chinese international student and Sydney University Postgraduate Representative Council president, saying, while he personally had a good experience using an agent, he had supported students who had been misled.
“They can give you a plan where you can get an offer, rather than get something that you’re suitable for,” he said.
The University of NSW has the State’s largest disclosed spend on education agents, last year paying more than AUS$ 59 million in commissions, according to its financial statements.
It amounted to a 38 percent increase in agent fees over the past five years despite international student numbers remaining relatively steady in the same time.
At the State’s largest educator of foreign students, Sydney University, the bill for agent fees was almost AUS$ 51 million last year, a 58 percent increase over five years but a slight drop from the year before.
Agent Commissions
Together, Sydney University, UNSW, UTS, Macquarie University and University of Wollongong spent AUS$ 147 million on agent commissions last year, according to their financial statements and figures provided on request.
No university revealed the percentage of international student fees it paid to agents in commission, but the peak body for education agents says the industry average for higher education is about 15 percent of first-year fees.
A Parliamentary inquiry into Australia’s international student sector last month recommended that the government acknowledge that regulation of agents was long overdue, and said that the case for education providers being forced to disclose to students the commission paid to agents was ‘overwhelming’.
Robert Parsonson, chief executive of the International Student Education Agents Association, told the Sydney Morning Herald that Australia’s early adoption of education agents was a key reason for its competitiveness in the international student market.
The association wants the Government to implement a certification policy for Australian education agents, but does not support the committee’s suggestion to require full transparency of commission fees, which Parsonson said would put Australia at a disadvantage against all competitor countries.
A Sydney University spokeswoman said the institution carefully selected, trained and monitored its agents to ensure they provided quality support to prospective students and complied with relevant legislation.
Education Minister Jason Clare has this year announced new proposed rules mainly targeting vocational colleges, including a proposed ban on agents receiving commissions for onshore transfers.
But he has not committed to improving transparency of agent commissions or greater regulation of the agent business more broadly. His office said the Minister will respond to the report’s recommendations in due course.
Private colleges across Australia are paying local education agents hundreds of thousands of dollars to recruit international students who were already in the country, including many who were enrolled in public universities.
Some agents who recruit students who are already in Australia are demanding colleges pay commissions of up to 50 percent in some cases, according to private college representatives. Additional cash bonuses as high as AUS$ 300,000 are also being offered for the recruitment of 100 students.
International students are required to complete six months of study onshore after enrolment before they can transfer. Some students are encouraged to leave university courses that cost up to AUS$ 30,000 or more in fees to enrol in vocational certificate and diploma courses with fees as low as AUS$ 6,000 a year. A proportion of those fees is returned to the agent as a commission, typically up to 30 percent.
Queensland International Business Academy, which has campuses in Sydney and Brisbane, offers agents a AUS$ 500 bonus for each student enrolled in its Australian Computer Society Professional Year programme. A spokesman for the college said it wanted to recruit more students to mitigate the loss of students who were moving to Canberra, which was classified as regional, giving students more points towards permanent residency.
Nationally overseas student enrolments in total fell by 6.6 percent in 2020 compared to 2019; however, vocational education providers have enrolled about 10 percent more students.
A spokeswoman for the Federal Department of Education Skills and Employment said transfers between courses were “a legitimate way in which international students exercise choice as consumers and can occur for a range of reasons.”
“Increasing restrictions on students could damage Australia’s competitiveness compared to other countries,” the spokeswoman said.
Sharmini, a young student from Sri Lanka said that the agents took a hefty fee and arranged a seat for her in the Architecture Department of a reputed Australian university. But she found that her subject knowledge was not enough to cope up with the architecture course.
Her plea to the agency to transfer her to an English literature course was summarily dismissed by the agent. She was compelled to work to earn money for her new degree course as the university refused to refund the annual fee she paid for the architecture course. The student suffers and the education agency takes commission from the student as well as from the university.
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