First Impressions: What your RTO’s website says about its compliance
Let’s pretend you are online searching for a registered training organisation (RTO) offering a course on….hot air ballooning (not real, I know, but come along for the ride). Imagine your results return 50 different RTOs.
How will you decide which one to go with? Here are some common comparison items students will look at:
Price (of course)
Length of course
Location
Flexibility
Currency of the course
Reviews & RTO reputation
Now let’s consider a different audience…the regulator. This may be ASQA, VRQA or TAC, or it could be one of the state funding regulators.
“They aren’t looking at our website” I hear you say, however, if this is what you’re thinking then you would be wrong.
Public Facing Compliance
An RTO’s main piece of public-facing information that is available to regulators is its website, along with social media. This is where information can be gathered about the RTO. While we shouldn’t judge a book by its cover, the website (and social media posts) provides information that will form first impressions for an auditor who may be conducting a risk assessment on an RTO to determine whether it may be subjected to further regulatory activities such as an audit. This first impression will give the auditor an inkling as to whether the RTO generally follows compliant practices.
Consider the following items as examples to illustrate.
Qualification Transition
A new release of a qualification came out 18 months ago and the RTO has updated the TAS, delivery materials, assessment, etc. However, they haven’t gotten around to updating the website yet as this is outsourced to a web development company. However, the ASQA auditor has picked up that the units listed on the website are not in alignment with the current packaging rules. The first impression indicates a non-compliant practice (even though internally everything else has been updated).
NRT Logo Use
The website has the NRT logo in the footer of the site and it is appearing on pages with non-accredited training being advertised. The first impression this gives is if the RTO doesn’t know they can’t use the NRT logo in the footer, then what else isn’t right?
Fee Collection & Shopping Carts
Learners undertaking a diploma qualification can enrol instantly online and pay upfront for the course. The shopping cart on the website allows learners to pay the full $5000 upfront. This would suggest to an auditor that the RTO doesn’t understand the rules for up-front collection of fees from an individual learner, and spark concerns around other practices devised to protect learners.
Final Word
It can be very simple to overlook how the information on your RTO’s website can be interpreted and essentially present a public facing non-compliance which will give an auditor the first impression that the RTO should be scrutinised more closely, even if that RTO’s practices are compliant otherwise.
How long since your RTO has conducted an in-depth website audit to make sure it was compliant? Our team can conduct an audit for you, including checking all downloadable links to ensure the contents being linked to are also compliant.
Alternatively, check out our Website Audit Template for your RTO to DIY!