Universities own the bribery risk in international recruitment

GERSA, a recently established global accreditation body focused on standards in international student recruitment, has published its third white paper (insert link) in as many months – this time examining the impact of the UK Bribery Act 2010 on higher education institutions.

The paper reminds universities that under section 7 of the Bribery Act, institutions can be held strictly liable for the actions of “associated persons” acting on their behalf anywhere in the world – and that includes overseas agents, sub-agents, pathway providers, joint venture partners, and intermediaries.

As GERSA makes clear, the question isn’t just whether universities have anti-bribery clauses in contracts but whether their commercial structures and working practices create risk that ought to have been anticipated.

Old news, new urgency

Back in 2013, Transparency International published its Anti-bribery principles for not-for-profit organisations, explicitly including universities. Charitable status, it warned, doesn’t shield organisations from corruption risk.

Over the past decade, we’ve seen media exposés, sector debates, and parliamentary scrutiny around international recruitment practices. The UK sector developed the Agent Quality Framework (AQF), in part as a defensive response designed to demonstrate professional standards and stave off regulatory intervention.

The AQF has had value – it’s raised awareness and formalised expectations. But it’s largely directed at agents and their training, certification, and behaviour.

What it hasn’t fundamentally addressed is the behaviour of universities – the institutions that appoint agents, compete on commission rates, design incentive structures, and set aggressive growth targets. As GERSA’s paper makes plain, the legal exposure sits with the university.

And it’s not just the Bribery Act that creates that exposure. The Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act 2024 (DMCC Act), which came into force in April 2025, makes universities liable under consumer law for anyone acting “in the name of or on behalf of” their business – including the same agents, sub-agents, and intermediaries caught by the Bribery Act. If an agent misleads a student about course quality, visa outcomes, or career prospects, the university can no longer disclaim responsibility by saying it didn’t authorise the claim. The liability test isn’t what the university intended – it’s what the student reasonably believed.

Follow the money

In many UK institutions, agent commission now represents the largest component of international student cost of acquisition. At some universities, effective commission exceeds 30 per cent of the total international tuition fee once bonuses, marketing allowances, and discretionary incentives are included.

We tend to analyse this through the competition lens – how do we compare with competitors, and can volume compensate for rising acquisition costs? But the Bribery Act requires a different lens – does our incentive structure create predictable pressure for improper inducement?

Colleagues who’ve operated in market know that in parts of the world, commission is shared with sponsor officials to secure nominations, school counsellors are quietly incentivised, sub-agents take layers of commission that universities never see, “marketing contributions” fund murky downstream practices, consultants are retained to “facilitate” TNE approvals with ministries or regulators, and middlemen smooth accreditation processes in opaque regulatory environments.

Not everywhere, and not in every transaction – but often enough to be real.

Universities may not formally authorise such practices, and senior leaders may never see a payment. But those with operational experience in international student recruitment understand that these realities exist in certain markets – we talk about them privately, reassure ourselves that “that’s just how the market works,” and trust that as long as enrolments are achieved, the detail remains distant.

Under strict liability, that distance is legally irrelevant. The test is whether the university had adequate procedures to prevent bribery and whether its structures created risk it could reasonably have foreseen.

Consumer law asks a related question. Under the DMCC Act, where a financial incentive is likely to affect a student’s decision – and a reasonable student would want to know about it – failing to disclose it may amount to a misleading omission. CMA guidance is clear that material information includes financial arrangements that could influence advice, particularly where those giving the advice present as impartial. If a student believes they are receiving independent guidance, and the agent’s recommendation is in fact driven by higher commission rather than educational fit, that’s not just an ethical problem – it’s a potential breach of the Act.

High commission rates don’t automatically equal bribery. But high commission rates layered on top of sub-agent chains, aggressive growth targets, and limited downstream visibility do create risk. That’s not an agent problem – it’s a university governance problem.

It’s a governance choice

Financial pressure on the sector is intense. Domestic fee freezes and rising costs have increased reliance on international income, and competition in key markets has sharpened.

In that environment, it’s tempting to treat commission simply as a cost line. But commission levels shape behaviour. If a university assumes 30–35 per cent commission is simply “market norm,” layers in volume bonuses to hit ambitious targets, relies heavily on aggregators with opaque downstream networks, and builds financial forecasts dependent on agent-heavy growth, it’s making a governance choice – not just a commercial one.

University governing bodies should be asking whether they can map their entire recruitment chain including sub-agents, whether they understand how commission is distributed downstream, whether they’ve stress-tested whether their incentive design could encourage improper conduct, and whether they’d be comfortable defending their acquisition model under regulatory scrutiny.

They should also be asking whether their oversight arrangements would satisfy the DMCC Act’s professional diligence standard – the duty to exercise the skill and care reasonably expected of a trader, in line with honest market practice. The CMA expects universities to vet agents, train them in UK consumer law and student rights, audit their conduct and promotional materials, and intervene swiftly when problems arise. Relying on contractual anti-bribery clauses alone won’t satisfy either regime – the Bribery Act demands adequate procedures, and consumer law demands active, ongoing oversight.

And for those universities which pay commission to schools and school counsellors – how would governors feel if their own child were at a school where advice on university applications was influenced by which universities pay that school a fee rather than which institution was most appropriate for them?

The Bribery Act’s “adequate procedures” defence demands evidence of active risk assessment and mitigation – not simply terms in a contract.

Don’t blame the agents

Agents are essential to international education. Many operate ethically and professionally, and the sector wouldn’t function without them.

But the tendency to rush to blame “rogue agents” misses the point. Agents operate within incentive frameworks designed by universities – universities appoint them, set commission structures, compete on rates, and decide how much transparency to demand over sub-agent networks. If risk exists, it’s shared – but ultimately, under the Bribery Act, it rests with the institution.

The same is true under consumer law. Section 225 of the DMCC Act confirms that liability follows the benefit – if a university gains from a student’s decision, and the student relied on a misleading impression made on its behalf, the law holds the university to account. Contract clauses that try to disclaim responsibility for agent statements – “we are not responsible for any representations made by our agents” – are likely to be unfair and unenforceable.

Other sectors have already learned that regulators look hard at incentive design itself. Financial services and pharmaceuticals have faced enforcement action not simply for illegal payments but for pay structures that created predictable behavioural risk. Higher education hasn’t yet experienced that level of enforcement pressure, but it would be complacent to assume it never will.

That enforcement pressure is also likely to come from a consumer protection direction. International students are recognised as vulnerable consumers under the DMCC Act – they face language barriers, unfamiliarity with UK systems, visa pressures, and enormous financial stakes. The CMA’s guidance is explicit: practices that would pass muster with a well-informed domestic consumer can still be unfair if they mislead the average member of a vulnerable group. The bar is higher, and it applies to the entire recruitment chain.

Defensible or not?

International recruitment is vital to UK higher education – it sustains research, cross-subsidises teaching, and supports financial viability. But long-term sustainability depends on more than margin. It depends on integrity.

The question UK universities can no longer avoid is this – are our commission structures and acquisition models defensible under a strict liability anti-bribery regime?

Pricing strategy, cost of acquisition, and bribery exposure aren’t separate conversations. They’re bound together. And neither are they separate from consumer protection law – the DMCC Act, CMA guidance, and OfS regulation are now asking many of the same questions about the same commercial structures. Universities that treat agent oversight as purely a bribery compliance exercise, without also considering their obligations to students as consumers, are addressing only half the risk.

As GERSA has now made clear, governance frameworks need to catch up with that reality.