Ofqual fines Pearson more than £2m over exam rule breaches

Ofqual has fined exam board Pearson more than £2m for serious regulatory breaches across three separate cases between 2019 and 2023, affecting tens of thousands of students.

The regulator issued two fines of £750k and a further penalty of £505k, among the highest imposed by Ofqual, after concluding that Pearson failed to meet required standards in the design, delivery and oversight of several qualifications.

One case related to Pearson’s GCSE English language 2.0 qualification, for which it was fined £750k. Ofqual found that Pearson failed to identify and manage the risk of inconsistent grading standards between the new qualification and its existing GCSE English language course, despite the regulator highlighting the issue in 2022 and 2023.

When grading standards were realigned in summer 2024, students received lower-than-expected results, which Ofqual said were correct but unexpected. The regulator said this undermined public confidence and prompted complaints. The qualification, introduced in 2022 and aimed largely at post-16 students resitting GCSE English, had 23,165 entries in 2023.

Pearson was also fined £505k over its Edexcel GCE A level in Chinese, covering spoken Mandarin and Cantonese. Ofqual’s review of assessments from 2019, 2022 and 2023 identified multiple problems with question setting and marking that did not meet regulatory requirements.

The regulator said Pearson failed to address the issues after concerns were raised by teachers and others. Around 12,000 students were affected, with non-native Chinese speakers found to be disproportionately disadvantaged because the assessments were inappropriately demanding.

A further £750k fine related to Pearson’s PTE Academic Online English language test, which was used by international students to meet university entry requirements. The online version, now discontinued, allowed about 5% of candidates to take the test remotely rather than at secure centres.

In 2023, Pearson identified malpractice in which other individuals sat the test on candidates’ behalf, bypassing remote invigilation safeguards. Pearson revoked 9,910 affected results but acknowledged that it should have identified the issue sooner and reported it earlier to Ofqual.

Amanda Swann, executive director for delivery at Ofqual, said: “These fines reflect the serious nature of Pearson’s failures as well as our commitment to protecting students’ interests and maintaining public confidence in our qualifications system.

“Students must be able to trust that their results, and those of their peers taking the same qualifications, accurately reflect their performance, in line with appropriate standards. Students’ work must also be their own.”

She added: “This action is necessary to deter Pearson and other awarding organisations from similar failings in future.”

The latest penalties mean Pearson has now been fined seven times by Ofqual. The regulator’s largest single fine was issued in 2022, when Pearson was ordered to pay £1.2m over failures in reviews of marking arrangements between 2016 and 2019.

Ofqual said its enforcement panel took mitigating factors into account when setting the latest fines, including Pearson’s acceptance of the breaches and its agreement to settle the cases.