PayPal says No to essay mills

PayPal has confirmed plans to remove essay mills from its site.

Last year, QAA called on influential online platforms to stop doing business with essay writing companies, in a campaign that targeted Bing, Yahoo, Google, Facebook, YouTube and PayPal.

Responding to today's decision by PayPal, QAA's head of policy and public affairs Gareth Crossman said:

'We wrote to PayPal in November last year asking it to close down payment facilities for the essay writing companies that encourage students to cheat. Today, PayPal has confirmed it will remove essay companies from its site.

'This decision is a huge step forwards in the battle to close down these unscrupulous operators.

'Essay companies rely heavily on payment platforms like PayPal to process students' orders. Removing this facility will significantly hamper their operation.

'Earlier this year, Google took down the paid for adverts placed by essay companies, following QAA’s letter to its UK head of operations last November.

‘And we will continue to put pressure on the online platforms that have not yet responded to our call for action.

'Essay companies remain a huge threat to the academic integrity of UK higher education.

'Recent research by Professor Phil Newton at Swansea University estimates that, from 2014 to the present, the percentage of students admitting to paying someone else to undertake their work was 15.7 per cent, or 31 million students around the globe.'

QAA works with a community of experts in academic integrity from across the UK to advise and act on plagiarism and cheating. For more information, visit our Academic Integrity section.