93% of adults don’t know that most tutors aren’t regulated. That’s the result of a 2024 survey of over 2,000 UK adults, commissioned by Tutors International, and it’s a stat that tracks. As a parent, when you think about how tightly regulated the state-wide education sector is (and with good reason), the logical assumption is that surely the same is true of the private sector as well, right?
Sadly, that’s just not true. The reality is that, as of now, the tutoring industry is effectively unregulated. Not lightly regulated, or loosely overseen. But zip. Zilch. There’s no statutory body, no mandatory checks, and no required qualifications to become a tutor.
I spent fifteen years as an educator before I went out and founded my own tutoring agency, Capital Tuition Group, and even I find that figure striking. But before you read that as a massive scandal waiting to happen, we need to consider the wider ramifications of it. As a parent looking for private tuition, that very fact that the industry is mostly unregulated is no doubt a shocking revelation. But, it gives you the ammunition you need to go out and ensure you find a tutoring company with the right checks in place, the right balances, and an audit trail to match.
For an agency, this should be an amber warning light for you to either a) get on top of your own compliance checks, and b) audit the ones you currently have in place. Ensuring your team is running above board, with all of the admin done now, is one hell of an advertisement for your own company (and why TotalOnboarder is so powerful in fact). But enough of that, let’s take the stats here, shall we?
Our survey says
I do want to be direct with you about the source first though. The research was commissioned by a tutoring company, which, well as we do here, has a horse in the regulation race so to speak. But it’s a properly conducted poll, with 2,010 UK adults surveyed in late October of 2024, all up to code (via Market Research Society standards). It isn’t just a flimsy PR exercise, trying to spin a marketing line.
The headline numbers too are hard to just hand wave away. 93% didn’t know that tutoring is unregulated, 91% didn’t know that tutors don’t necessarily need to hold any formal qualifications, and a large share assumed (wrongly) that anyone teaching their child must already have passed a background check. In short, parents are running on a set of assumptions that simply aren’t true.
Is private tutoring really that unregulated?
Yep, that’s the truth of it. It’s also worth being accurate here on what that exactly means. Yes, there is technically no statutory regulator for private tutoring in the UK. No Ofsted, no Teaching Regulation Agency, anyone can call themselves a tutor. There’s no legal requirement to hold a teaching qualification, and no requirement to have a DBS check either, or even a register that parents can search.
That’s not entirely the fault of the sector either. At last as of January 2026, self-employed tutors can finally apply for an Enhanced DBS check directly, where their role is eligible. That closes a long-standing loophole that often left a self-employed tutor unable to obtain a check that a school would run as standard. It’s progress, yes, but note the word “can”. It’s possible to do so, but not required to do so by law.
Why a trust gap is an opportunity, not a threat
For agencies, the same research found that parents care enormously about exactly the things they wrongly assume are already guaranteed. Many said they would only hire a tutor with a valid DBS check. Many would only hire one with a recognised qualification. The demand for assurance is already there, it’s just gone unmet.
And that’s the gap. An agency that vets properly, checks thoroughly, and (crucially) shows its working, isn't just being responsible, it's offering the one thing the market has been asking for and rarely getting. In a sector where the floor is "anyone can do this," visible standards aren't a cost centre, they're your strongest sales argument. It's the exact same reason I'm relaxed about AI arriving in classrooms, what parents are really buying is a person they can trust, not a piece of software.
What should you look for as a parent
The conversation is shifting, and faster than you might think. Platforms and providers across the sector spent early 2026 publicly urging parents to ask harder questions, and the good news is you don't need to be an expert to do it.
The signals of a properly run agency are simple to ask for and much harder to fake: an enhanced DBS check on every tutor (not just a vague "we carry out checks"), references that have actually been taken up, a written safeguarding policy they can send you, and clear evidence of a tutor's qualifications and experience before they interact with your child. And the one question worth more than all the rest, ask it plainly: "how do you know this person is safe to teach my son, my daughter?"
You'll learn as much from how they answer as from what they say. A good agency will have all of this to hand and walk you through it without a flicker, because they've done the work, and they're glad you asked.
A weaker one gets vague, or a touch defensive, or offers to "find out and come back to you." That hesitation is your answer. In an unregulated market, an agency's willingness to show you the receipts is the closest thing to a guarantee you'll get, so treat it as exactly that: a test, and a fair one.
The trust gap
My advice, having run an agency through exactly this shift, is this: stop treating your vetting as back-office admin and start treating it as part of the product. Put your standards on your website. Tell parents plainly what you check and why. As the national conversation becomes more focused toward safeguarding in education, the agencies that can produce a clean, complete, instantly available vetting trail will win the work that others simply can't.
The trust gap that parents didn't even know existed is the gap you get to fill. So don't hide your standards in order to compete on price. Advertise them, and compete on trust.