Fake Accreditation Warning The TEFL Academy review, submitted by Mia Williams.

Fake Accreditation Warning.

The TEFL Academy – TTA (https://www.theteflacademy.com/) claims to be accredited by Ofqual, TQUK, QUALIFI, DEAC, and AQC.

This is intentionally misleading because these are regulatory bodies and not accreditation bodies.

TEFL students are reporting to Trusted TEFL Reviews that when applying for jobs outside of Ireland and the UK, their TEFL Academy certificates are often not being accepted – both during the job interview process and during the work visa process.

Essential TEFL Tip!

Are you worried about being scammed? TEFL course scams are becoming more sophisticated, and (TTA) The TEFL Academy has been proven to be a scam!

Protect yourself from TEFL scams.

We strongly recommend choosing from one of the 5 Best Online TEFL/TESOL certification course programs in 2026:

The 5 Best Online TEFL/TESOL Courses in 2026

By choosing from one of the 5 Best Online TEFL/TESOL Certification Course Programs, you are guaranteed not to be scammed.

Choose a fully accredited and internationally recognized online TEFL/TESOL certification course that you can use for all online and abroad teaching English jobs.

Mia Williams – Trusted TEFL Reviews

Concerning TEFL students reporting that when applying for jobs outside of Ireland and the UK, their TEFL Academy certificates are often not being accepted: https://trustedteflreviews.com/2019/03/25/the-tefl-academy-certification-review/

It also appears that The TEFL Academy is employing graduates of their program to act as ‘Brand Ambassadors’ – pushing the notion that only a TEFL Academy certificate will suffice and that other TEFL TESOL programs are inferior products.

If you stumble across any blog or other website that is critical of any Online TEFL TESOL program other than the TEFL Academy – offering The TEFL Academy as an alternative, better option – we recommend taking the contents of that blog or website with a healthy helping of salt.

It will simply be a front for directing readers to an alternative TEFL course: The TEFL Academy.

In conclusion, The TEFL Academy certificate will be fine if you plan on teaching English in Ireland or the UK. However, for international teaching jobs, we would recommend choosing a Fully Accredited and internationally recognized TEFL TESOL certification course program.

April 25, 2022 update:

As it turns out, a TEFL Academy (TTA) certificate is not even accepted in Ireland as a teaching English as a foreign language qualification.

Trusted TEFL Reviews received a carbon copy of an email, from a worried TTA TEFL certificate holder, in which The TEFL Academy clearly states that its certificates are not valid for teaching English jobs in Ireland.

This news comes as quite a shock because the TEFL Academy’s main headquarters are in Dublin, Ireland.

Not even the country where the company is located will accept its certificates.

A TEFL Academy certificate should be fine for some low-paid teaching English jobs.

For better-paid teaching English online and abroad job opportunities, we recommend choosing a Fully Accredited TEFL/TESOL program.

Institutions providing Online TEFL programs with Fully Accredited status include:

ACCET – Accrediting Council for Continuing Education and Training | https://accet.org/

ACTEFLC – Accreditation Council for Teaching English as a Foreign Language Courses | https://www.acteflc.com/

OISE – University of the Toronto Faculty of Education | https://www.oise.utoronto.ca/

TESL Canada | https://tesl.ca/

University of Cambridge’s English Language Assessment | https://www.cambridgeenglish.org/

Online TEFL courses that are directly accredited by the Ministry of Education also enjoy Fully Accredited status.

The following Online TEFL/TESOL programs (in alphabetical order) are Fully Accredited and internationally recognized:

Bridge TEFL | https://bridge.edu/tefl/ | Bridge TEFL verified trusted TEFL reviews.

CIEE TEFL | https://www.ciee.org/ | CIEE TEFL verified trusted TEFL reviews.

Maximo Nivel TEFL | https://maximonivel.com/ | Maximo Nivel verified trusted TEFL reviews.

ontesol | https://ontesol.com/ | ontesol verified trusted TEFL reviews.

OISE University of Toronto TEFL | https://teflonline.teachaway.com/ | OISE TEFL verified trusted TEFL reviews.

Oxford Seminars | https://www.oxfordseminars.com/ | Oxford Seminars verified trusted TEFL reviews.

TEFL Iberia | https://tefl-iberia.com/ | TEFL Iberia verified trusted TEFL reviews.

TEFL Online Pro (Teachers’ Choice Award winner, 2019 | 2020 | 2021 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025) | https://teflonlinepro.com/ | TEFL Online Pro verified trusted TEFL reviews.

Trusted TEFL Reviews recently tried to reach out (twice) to The TEFL Academy, for a clear answer to their bogus accreditation claims. For reasons of fairness, we also reached out to a competing program of The TEFL Academy – TEFL Online Pro – and the results of our telephone conversations can be read in this article:

https://trustedteflreviews.com/2021/05/01/the-accreditation-watchdog-the-tefl-academy-versus-tefl-online-pro/

Learn more about TEFL TESOL accreditation:

https://trustedteflreviews.com/tefl-accreditation-guide/

https://trustedteflreviews.com/2021/03/28/tefl-tesol-accreditation-101/

Related article: https://trustedteflreviews.com/2021/03/30/6-tefl-red-flags/

Read more The TEFL Academy reviews

New! Click here for the online TEFL/TESOL international certification course Teachers’ Choice Award winner. International Online TEFL/TESOL course certification at its best.

Verified Online TEFL/TESOL certification course program reviews, ranked in order of customer satisfaction: TEFL Course Directory

TEFL Accreditation Guide | 6 TEFL Red Flags | TTR Home | TEFL Course Special Offers

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6 TEFL Red Flags – avoid getting scammed on your course purchase.

6 TEFL Red Flags that the TEFL course that you are about to purchase may likely be a TEFL certification scam!

1. The company has a Facebook page but has turned off the Reviews tab.

The manipulation of reviews is a massive issue within the TEFL course industry, and this manipulation shows up in many forms:

1. Almost all of the major TEFL review websites are privately owned and earn money via affiliate marketing – meaning that they exist because of backhanders from the TEFL companies that publish reviews. It is, therefore, in the financial interests of those sites to promote positive reviews – whether real or fake – and discreetly hide the negative reviews.
2. Some TEFL programs employ “Brand Ambassadors” to promote their courses – also through affiliate marketing – and these TEFL program minions will write absolutely anything to get you to buy the TEFL course(s) they are promoting. Sometimes the blogger has taken the course and sometimes they have no experience with it whatsoever.
3. Many review websites, such as Trustpilot, charge companies for the pleasure of being listed. Trustpilot is known for its relaxed attitude to not following up and verifying reviews. Some of the well-known companies that have Trustpilot listings take full advantage of this by flooding their listing with fake reviews. Companies listed on Trustpilot also have the option of paying to have poor reviews deleted.
4. There are also TEFL programs that promote negative SEO, by publishing negative reviews online about their business competitors.
5. Facebook (Meta) has recently been messing around (upgrading) with the Pages experience. this means that now you need to be logged into Facebook to view a company’s reviews. On the mobile version, it is difficult to find the Reviews section. Our advice is to log into Facebook, using a laptop, and check whether a program has its Reviews tab turned on or off. If their Reviews tab is turned off, something fishy is going on.

We don’t allow TEFL companies to manipulate their reviews on Trusted TEFL Reviews and we don’t charge TEFL companies anything for listing their programs.

The only advertising allowed is granted to the TEFL program winner of the annual Teachers’ Choice Award. TEFL Online Pro is the winner of this year’s award, so they have been given the opportunity to promote any TEFL course discounts that they may run during the year. This additional exposure on Trusted TEFL Reviews is without charge for the TEFL program currently enjoying Teachers’ Choice Award winner status.

2. The company is falsifying its accreditation status.

There are legitimate international TEFL accreditation bodies, there are questionable international TEFL accreditation bodies, and there are made-up international TEFL accreditation bodies.

Having worked in the TEFL industry for many years now, it is easy for me to be able to distinguish between all three.

Regarding the latter, you can notice these from a mile away because they almost always tend to show generic stock footage photos of businesspeople in boardrooms, wearing suits, and looking very serious about some type of business issue.

The people who run reputable TEFL accreditation bodies don’t hang around all day in boardrooms, wearing business suits.

To save yourself a whole load of wasted time and effort, we strongly recommend that you read the TEFL Accreditation Guide before parting ways with your hard-earned cash:

https://trustedteflreviews.com/tefl-accreditation-guide/

3. Level 5 TEFL courses.

Five years ago, no one had heard of a “Level 5” TEFL course.

You simply chose between an onsite or online TEFL/TESOL/TESL certification course – 120 hours being the industry standard.

Then came along the first few mentions of “Level 5” and more recently it has become very popular to claim that a Level 5 course is the best TEFL course to take.

Employers don’t give two hoots whether you took an over-priced Level 5 TEFL course or not. “Level 5” is just another marketing gimmick – of which there are numerous in this industry.

Employers of teachers online and overseas, and government job visa departments, want to see proof that you have completed a 120-hour TEFL/TESOL certification course.

If you already have teaching experience then a course covering fewer hours will often do, but the industry standard is 120 hours.

Should you wish to, you can also choose a course that adds a practical teaching component to the 120-hour standard regulation – recalculating the total number of hours in the course to a maximum of between 140 and 150.

Any course consisting of more than 120 hours (or between 140-150 hours with the practical teaching component) is unnecessary and won’t, in any way or form, increase your chances of landing a teaching job or getting your work visa.

Also, the Ofqual company that regulates the Level 5 TEFL syllabus – based in the UK – is not an accreditation awarding body. They only regulate the courses. This means that you can pay extra and take a Level 5 TEFL course, but that is no assurance that your certificate will be recognized by online and overseas employers.

It definitely won’t guarantee you better employment prospects over a fully accredited 120-hour TEFL/TESOL course.

In any TEFL job interview situation, it is the 120-hour TEFL/TESOL certification course that you will be asked to provide proof of having taken – i.e., the accepted industry standard.

Our advice is to place less importance on the brand of the TEFL/TESOL qualification and, instead, focus on whether the course is truly internationally recognized.

The vast majority of people reading this article will need to take a 120-hour TEFL/TESOL course to teach English online or overseas.

Take a look at the TEFL Directory for guidance:

https://trustedteflreviews.com/tefl-course-directory/

The top-rated schools in the directory are top-rated for a legitimate reason.

4. The course costs less than $50.

TEFL isn’t rocket science, but it does take relatively thorough training to become a TEFL teacher.

TEFL programs that offer dirt-cheap TEFL courses for under $50 are simply providing you with a piece of paper that says you are a qualified TEFL teacher. Claiming to be a TEFL teacher and having the skills and knowledge to be one are two completely different things.

Our advice is not to go for the cheap TEFL courses.

You should treat your TEFL course as an investment, and not as a shortcut to getting qualified to teach English online or overseas – something you likely won’t be able to do anyway when you invest so little in your online education.

5. TEFL programs that try to undermine the reputation of Trusted TEFL Reviews.

Trusted TEFL Reviews publishes every review that has been proven to come from a reliable source – AKA a real TEFL graduate.

We never delete poor reviews – although we are constantly asked to do so – and some TEFL companies that are so used to manipulating their customer reviews online choose to try and undermine the reputation of Trusted TEFL Reviews when we refuse to delete a poor review, or when we refuse to publish a review that has been written by a TEFL school’s staff member.

We recommend reading the Common TEFL Scams article to learn more about this:

https://trustedteflreviews.com/2021/03/30/common-tefl-scams/

6. The TEFL course is free.

We have noticed that a few relatively new online TEFL/TESOL programs are advertising their courses as “free”.

Given that businesses tend to traditionally operate on a business model whereby they create revenue in exchange for services rendered, our attention was piqued by this apparent middle finger to traditional business model marketing.

So, we did a bit of digging around to see how a business could run a profit by offering a free TEFL course.

We conclude that the so-called “free” course is just a front for charging you throughout the course in the form of unexpected, hidden charges.

We also noticed that the free TEFL courses – all of them – are not accredited.

7. Bonus Red Flag: Affiliate Marketing.

The TEFL Affiliate Marketing Scam is a massive issue within the TEFL industry.

These TEFL program sales minions are extremely adept at stretching the truth and creating false narratives.

If you stumble across their website or blog, you will read about how such and such a program (always a program they earn affiliate marketing sales commissions from) is the best choice, and how such and such a program (always a competitor that doesn’t do affiliate marketing) is a scam or just not trustworthy.

If you believe their shtick and enroll in one of the courses that they are promoting, you will likely end up paying for a subpar TEFL course that isn’t fully accredited, and the friendly person recommending the program(s) will stand to earn a sizable sales commission.

No reputable, fully accredited TEFL/TESOL certification course program operates via an affiliate’s marketing campaign model. They just can’t because their accreditation codes of practice don’t allow it.

We recommend reading the TEFL Affiliate Marketing Scam article to learn more about this:

https://trustedteflreviews.com/2022/02/07/tefl-affiliate-marketing-scam/

This ‘6 TEFL Red Flags’ article was written by Mia Williams, co-owner of Trusted TEFL Reviews (TTR) | Best Featured TEFL Articles

New! Click here for the online TEFL/TESOL international certification course Teachers’ Choice Award winner. International Online TEFL/TESOL course certification at its best.

Verified Online TEFL/TESOL certification course program reviews, ranked in order of customer satisfaction: TEFL Course Directory

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TEFL TESOL Accreditation 101

TEFL TESOL Accreditation 101.

This article has been updated on December 21, 2025.

TEFL TESOL Accreditation 101.

(A list of institutions providing Online TEFL programs ‘Fully Accredited’ status appears towards the bottom of this article.)

This is quite a long article. It is an honest, factual, serious look at the question of Online TEFL/TESOL/TESL accreditation.

If you are researching which Online TEFL/TESOL/TESL course to take, this article should be essential reading for you.

For sake of convenience, and to avoid repetition, we will use the generic term ‘TEFL’ instead of mentioning ‘TEFL/TESOL/TESL’ each time these terms require a mention. These terms do have their differences in meaning, but for all intents and purposes, they essentially refer to the same type of training and this is why most teacher-training programs advertise their courses with one or more of these acronyms listed.

One of the most common misconceptions about Online TEFL courses, and one of the main areas that permit room for the peddling of misinformation, is the heated topic of accreditation.

Over the past few years, Online TEFL programs have discovered that it is much easier to sell their courses if they claim that their courses are accredited.

The result of this ‘accreditation fever’ has been the mushrooming creation of “accreditation bodies” that have been created by savvy business people with little or no background in education.

Some TEFL schools have also jumped on the bandwagon; creating fictitious accreditation websites, in order to make their courses seem more credible – all the while deceiving their customers and perpetuating the ‘accreditationspiracy’.

In addition to the above, some Online TEFL programs try to convince consumers that their programs are more credible because they are “accredited and regulated” by AQC, Ofqual, QUALIFI. These are not accreditation bodies, they are regulatory bodies. There is, a major difference, and the “Level 5” TEFL course brand (which was only recently created) is just another marketing gimmick to try to convince the consumer that you should take their Online TEFL program.

The truth of the matter is that there isn’t one international accreditation body for Online TEFL courses.

Therefore, we begin this article with the plain unadorned fact that the Online TEFL industry is completely unregulated, and the term ‘accredited’, when applied to Online TEFL/TESOL certification course programs, is purely a marketing gimmick. This, in turn, has created a snowball effect, whereby most people who are looking to take an Online TEFL course now place accreditation status high on their tick box list that a TEFL program must include.

Some government visa agencies, and some language schools, have also bought into the accreditation fallacy; stipulating that their teachers must hold an accredited TEFL certificate if they want to work for them and if they want to be able to legally teach in their country.

I have been teaching for over ten years now, and I have not once been asked whether my TEFL certificate is accredited or not. I have also never been asked whether my TEFL certification was taken online or in-person. I live and work in Austria, where the authorities are sticklers for correct documentation.

So if accreditation means relatively very little, is it completely worthless?

And which accreditation bodies are more trustworthy than others?

Accreditation is important when it provides the customer with an extra layer of consumer protection.

Accreditation can be divided into four main camps:

1. An Online TEFL program simply chooses not to capitulate to the pressure of being accredited and remains an Unaccredited provider.
2. An Online TEFL program creates an accreditation website itself, for the sole purpose of convincing consumers that they are a credible institution. This is usually a short-term fix because no amount of convincing can hide a subpar product and poor customer service. Trusted TEFL Reviews classes these Online TEFL programs ‘Unaccredited‘ and such programs should be avoided. They should be avoided because the training will be poor, you will have very little (if any) consumer rights, and you could become a victim of fraud.
3. An Online TEFL program capitulates to the pressure of being accredited and pays an annual fee to an accreditation body, and in return, they can claim that they are an accredited Online TEFL program. The accreditation body may, or may not, follow through on their promises that they maintain high levels of accountability regarding the Online TEFL programs that they accredit. Trusted TEFL Reviews classes these Online TEFL programs ‘Accredited‘ and such programs should be chosen after due diligence is carried out regarding their (verified) customer reviews on trustedteflreviews.com.
4. An Online TEFL program capitulates to the pressure of being accredited and pays an annual fee to an accreditation body, and in return, they can claim that they are an accredited Online TEFL program. The accreditation body ensures high standards of culpability and follows through on their promises that they maintain high levels of accountability regarding the Online TEFL programs that they accredit. Trusted TEFL Reviews classes these Online TEFL programs ‘Fully Accredited‘ and such programs tend anyway to receive consistently positive student feedback. This is not always the rule, though, so always check the (verified) customer reviews on trustedteflreviews.com.

Institutions providing Online TEFL programs Fully Accredited status include:

ACCET – Accrediting Council for Continuing Education and Training | https://accet.org/

ACTEFLC – Accreditation Council for Teaching English as a Foreign Language Courses | https://www.acteflc.com/

OISE – University of the Toronto Faculty of Education | https://www.oise.utoronto.ca/

TESL Canada | https://tesl.ca/

University of Cambridge’s English Language Assessment | https://www.cambridgeenglish.org/

Online TEFL courses that are directly accredited by a Ministry of Education also enjoy Fully Accredited status.

The following Online TEFL/TESOL programs (in alphabetical order) are Fully Accredited and internationally recognized:

Bridge TEFL | https://bridge.edu/tefl/ | Bridge TEFL verified trusted TEFL reviews.

CIEE TEFL | https://www.ciee.org/ | CIEE TEFL verified trusted TEFL reviews.

Maximo Nivel TEFL | https://maximonivel.com/ | Maximo Nivel verified trusted TEFL reviews.

ontesol | https://ontesol.com/ | ontesol verified trusted TEFL reviews.

OISE University of Toronto TEFL | https://teflonline.teachaway.com/ | OISE TEFL verified trusted TEFL reviews.

Oxford Seminars | https://www.oxfordseminars.com/ | Oxford Seminars verified trusted TEFL reviews.

TEFL Iberia | https://tefl-iberia.com/ | TEFL Iberia verified trusted TEFL reviews.

TEFL Online Pro (Teachers’ Choice Award winner, 2019 | 2020 | 2021 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025) | https://teflonlinepro.com/ | TEFL Online Pro verified trusted TEFL reviews.

TEFL/TESOL online programs that win the Teachers’ Choice Award are granted the ability to enjoy a whole year’s free exposure on Trusted TEFL Reviews, where they may post, for example, any current course discounts or promotions on the Trusted TEFL Reviews website.

You can check to see whether an Online TEFL/TESOL Program is Unaccredited, Accredited, or Fully Accredited by clicking on their category in the sidebar. The mention of which accreditation status they hold is clearly stated at the top of their category page, above the program’s review(s).

Unaccredited courses are identified with the statement, ‘Is [Online TEFL Program] accredited? No.‘

Accredited courses are identified with the statement, ‘Is [Online TEFL Program] accredited? Yes. The certification awarded is Accredited.’

Fully Accredited courses are identified with the statement, ‘Is [Online TEFL Program] accredited? Yes. The certification awarded is Fully Accredited and internationally recognized.‘

If you are having difficulties locating a program’s category page, you can easily locate it by clicking on their live link in the TEFL Course Directory: https://trustedteflreviews.com/tefl-course-directory/

Important information about Ofqual and TQUK-regulated courses:

Ofqual and TQUK are often (incorrectly) claimed to accredit Online TEFL programs offering a ‘Level 5’ certificate. Some Level 5 programs even go as far as to claim that the Level 5 TEFL certificate is the same as the CELTA certificate. ‘Level 5’ refers to one of the levels on the Regulated Qualifications Framework (RQF) in Great Britain and Northern Ireland. In other words, it’s a United Kingdom qualification that means very little to anyone outside of the UK. Furthermore, a qualification assessed at Level 5 doesn’t mean that it is “equivalent to the CELTA qualification”. Instead, it means that the level of education, knowledge, and skills required to complete the course is the same as that required to complete the CELTA, i.e., to be over 18, and to have a level of English and education that is equivalent to the average UK high school graduate.

Ofqual and TQUK are regulatory bodies, not accreditation bodies.

Ofqual and TQUK are regulatory bodies, not accreditation bodies.

A TEFL program can be regulated by Ofqual and be accredited or fully accredited by an external accreditation body, but this is not always the case.

A number of Ofqual-regulated TEFL programs blatantly lie to their customers by claiming that they are Ofqual accredited, or lie and claim that they are Ofqual regulated and fully accredited by another body that only regulates courses.

Ofqual and TQUK-regulated courses should provide you with a high level of TEFL training (although this is by no means guaranteed) but Ofqual and TQUK are by no means of the stretch of the imagination accreditation bodies.

One final point is that the accreditation industry in itself is highly competitive.

An argument that we often see is that a certain accreditation body should be taken more seriously than another simply because they have been in operation for longer.
This is absolute hogwash.
It doesn’t matter if an accreditation body has been in operation for one month or ten years.
What matters is whether the main accreditation members of the body are master’s-degree educated (in the field of Education), have years of credible experience in the field of TEFL and whether the accreditation body honors the rights of consumers.
Too many self-proclaimed “established” accreditation bodies have been set up by private individuals, with no university education and little to no experience in TEFL, and with just one mission: to make money and to hell with standards.

And our last (important) point:

When you apply for an English teacher job, online or abroad, IF your employer does ask whether your certificate is accredited, they sure as hell won’t ask WHICH company accredited your certificate.

What DOES matter, and what is ESSENTIAL, is that the Online TEFL course that you took actually taught you how to teach English.

Help with finding teaching work after the course should also be a priority, but NEVER pay any company to help find you a job. And NEVER accept a job placement agreement. There is so much work available and an Online TEFL program that will help you find work, as a free service when you pay for the course, is the preferential route.

Yes, you can save your money and buy a 120-Hour Online TEFL course for under $100 US, and you can enjoy the short-term-lived, feel-good emotion that you “got TEFL certified”, but the real proof of the pudding comes when you are sat in front of an experienced interviewer or stood in front of an actual class of students, and when you will very quickly realize that the course you completed in under a day has, in no way, whatsoever, prepared you for any of this. And then, inevitably, you won’t hear back from the school and you will, inevitably, have to begin a new search for another Online TEFL course to take – one that will properly prepare you for the job you want to train for.

Therefore, in conclusion to this TEFL TESOL Accreditation 101 article, always aim for a fully accredited Online TEFL program.

Quality 120-Hour Online TEFL courses begin from around $150 US. Pay anything less and you will be selling yourself and your future students short.

This ‘TEFL TESOL Accreditation 101’ article was written by Mia Williams, co-owner of Trusted TEFL Reviews (TTR) | Best Featured TEFL Articles

New! Click here for the online TEFL/TESOL international certification course Teachers’ Choice Award winner. International Online TEFL/TESOL course certification at its best.

Verified Online TEFL/TESOL certification course program reviews, ranked in order of customer satisfaction: TEFL Course Directory

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