“There is an ongoing investigation of the background data to consider the scale of the problem and remediations.”

Skyline International College in Burwood offered a bonus of up to $2000 for the recruitment of more than 10 students in a promotion from September 2020 to February. Its marketing officer,Gina Mya,said the college also offered a per-student enrolment commission of between 25 and 30 per cent of the course fees which ranged from $6000 to $15,600 per year.

Another,King’s Own Institute in Sydney’s CBD,offered agents a one-off cash bonus of up to $3000 per student if they enrolled 100 or more students for the March intake this year.

Marketing manager Salman Hatimali said all education providers were “suffering from the recruitment impact of ongoing border closures”. He said the promotion was “price matching” other providers offering bonuses and commissions to agents.

The Australian Institute of Higher Education in Sydney last year offered agents a bonus of $1000 and a commission of $960 for students recruited to enrol in various courses. AIHE director of student recruitment Michelle Willoughby said it received very few transfer students,and those who transferred were “usually those who might be struggling in a larger university environment and want a smaller institution”.

“The majority of our students come via VET pathways or directly from offshore year 12,” she said.

“All Australian institutions,including public universities pay agents incentives in the form of commissions and/or bonuses – we are no different.”

Queensland International Business Academy,which has campuses in Sydney and Brisbane,offers agents a $500 bonus for each student enrolled in its Australian Computer Society Professional Year program. 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.

Skills Australia Institute in Adelaide and Perth has offered agents $1000 for each of 10 or more student enrolments and $500 per student for five to nine enrolments. The college did not respond to requests for comment.

An education agent who recruits students from overseas and who spoke to theHerald on the condition of anonymity said agents were “churning” international students through multiple courses,and he had come across some who had been “hopping courses” for more than 10 years.

Ravi Singh,managing director of Global Reach which represents Australian universities in south Asia and president of the Association of Australian Education Representatives in India,has called for a review on commissions paid to onshore agents.

“Certain onshore education/migration agents pass on part of the commissions and some of the low quality institutions are doing most of the international recruitment through onshore poaching from other providers,” he said. “Movement is mostly away from universities and sadly the elements to attract students include low cost,multiple instalments,flexible classes and cash-back through onshore agents.”

Phil Honeywood ‎chief executive officer of the ‎International Education Association of Australia said many students were seeking out less expensive tuition fees because they were struggling financially. And some were “being wooed by onshore agents who are not telling the students they are getting up to 50 per cent commission”.

A Herald analysis of federal government student enrolment figures shows the number of international students registering for new vocational courses exceeded those joining higher education classes in November 2020 as new university starters fell by more than 40,000 compared to 2019.

Nationally overseas student enrolments in total fell by 6.6 per cent in 2020 compared to 2019,however,vocational education providers have enrolled about 10 per cent 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”.

She said the department was monitoring course transfer patterns:“to date,analysis of the available evidence has not identified patterns of concern”.

“Increasing restrictions on students could damage Australia’s competitiveness compared to other countries,” the spokeswoman said.