What ESOS Amendment Means for Agent Aggregators

The Australian government has just enacted sweeping reforms to the ESOS framework via the Education Legislation Amendment (Integrity and Other Measures) Act 2025. These changes aim to restore integrity to the international-education sector, curb exploitation of overseas students, and reduce misuse of the student visa system. 

For many stakeholders, including agents and aggregators, who recruit and funnel overseas students to Australian institutions, this marks a major shift.

What’s New Under the 2025 Amendments

Key updates that directly affect agents, aggregators, and their relationships with education providers:

• The notion of “education agent” has been redefined more broadly. Anybody not permanently employed by a provider who recruits overseas students, including casual contractors or third-party intermediaries, may now be classified as an “education agent.”
  
• For the first time, a legal definition of “education agent commission” has been introduced. This doesn’t just cover straightforward monetary payments, it also includes any benefit “in connection with international recruitment.”
  
• Providers must now collect and report detailed information about their agents and commissions to regulators.
  
  

What This Means for Agent Aggregators

Agent aggregators are entities that manage networks of sub-agents or broker student referrals to education providers. Their operations may now be especially vulnerable under the new regime. Here is why:

• Broader definition of “agent”: Many aggregators rely on subcontractors, part-time recruiters, or complex referral networks. Under the new law, these subcontractors may all be legally defined as “education agents”, meaning aggregators might be responsible (directly or indirectly) for ensuring compliance under ESOS.
  
• Commission scrutiny: Because “agent commissions” now include any benefit related to hiring, even non-cash incentives or payments that aren’t direct may need to be reported. This erodes a degree of flexibility and opaqueness that some aggregators have previously relied on.
  
• Disclosure & transparency obligations: Providers will demand full visibility over the entire agent/aggregator chain. Aggregators who cannot provide robust, auditable data may lose access.
  

Pressure on Business Models

• Less space for low-margin, volume-driven recruitment schemes: Aggregator models that rely on high-volume referrals and small per-student margins, often through aggressive marketing or incentives, may no longer be viable under heightened regulation.
  
• Increased liability and compliance costs: Aggregators will likely need to invest in compliance infrastructure (tracking, reporting, contracts), renegotiate arrangements with sub-agents, and perhaps scale down operations to manage risk.
  
• Risk of exclusion or de-registration: If a provider they supply is suspended or de-registered (or if the aggregator itself is deemed to have questionable practices), aggregators lose their primary conduit to international students, possibly jeopardising entire business models.
  

What Should Providers Be Doing Right Now

1. Audit your entire agent/sub-agent network: map out every person or entity involved in student recruitment, check whether they fall under the new “education agent” definition, and ensure contracts reflect compliance with ESOS obligations.
   
2. Track and document all incentives, payments and benefits: not just direct fees but any in-kind, indirect benefit or referral fee potentially classified as an “agent commission”.
   
3. Prioritise transparency and ethics: move away from volume-focused (number-driven) recruitment and towards a model where student interest, integrity, compliance and post-enrolment support matter.
   
4. Strengthen relationships with providers: build partnerships based on trust, data sharing, and compliance. Providers will now rely heavily on accurate commission and agent-use reporting.
   
5. Prepare for increased regulatory oversight: ensure PRISMS records, commission disclosures, documentation of agent relationships, and compliance history are in order, especially if operating across multiple providers or countries.
   

The 2025 amendments to the ESOS Act is far from being a minor regulatory update, they represent a fundamental rebalancing of power in Australia’s international-education system. For many agent aggregators, the old playbook of relying on loose subcontracting, opaque commission arrangements, and high-volume recruiting, may now be untenable.

We have developed a suite of resources for agent management within Educli. Contact us if you are interested to learn more. https://www.educli.com/en/contact-us 

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