Nigerian agents are reportedly being targeted by police or hired security services to retrieve large deposit payments students have paid when applying to study in the UK.
Meanwhile, concerns are escalating over the future safety of university representatives in the country, as tensions mount over who is accountable.
Several institutions have a policy of keeping tuition fee deposits to prospective students if UKVI decides that they are not a genuine student following a study visa interview.
Study visa rejections for Nigeria have soared to 21% in Q1 of 2026, despite the fact students pay their prospective university between £4,000 and £8,000 in upfront tuition fees to prove they are legitimate and financially capable of supporting themselves in the UK.
Speaking to one master agent, The PIE News has learned that the situation has become increasingly volatile as families resort to intimidation tactics or police assistance to try to retrieve deposit funds that they believe to have been stolen.
“As visas are being refused after a UKVI interview, universities are often refusing to refund the deposit,” explained the agent. “The problem is students are then reporting their university counsellor to the police, believing their agent has kept the money.”
“No one would expect a university to [treat] a student in the way they are doing – so naturally the agent gets blamed and is detained until the deposit is paid back,” they added.
The situation mirrors an incident in Pakistan where a student with a gun entered an agent’s office to demand the return of a tuition fee deposit.
No one would expect a university to [treat] a student in the way they are doing
Anonymous master agent
Internet-based scamming is common in Nigeria, with gangs known as the ‘Yahoo Boys’ running extortion practices online. As a result, there is a common assumption that unreturned deposits are part of a similar deception, designed to extort money from families who invest in their children’s education.
As a result, aspiring international students are fighting back by hiring local assailants to reverse the extortion and retrieve funds from their agents, regardless of their chosen university’s position.
“The aim is to intimidate the agents,” the master agent explained. “As a result, we have had to bail out colleagues who are being arrested or extorted. The situation is getting really dangerous, but our university partners don’t want to know.”
The PIE has been investigating the British universities who have collected millions of pounds in tuition fee deposits from students who they deemed to be compliant but were ultimately refused a visa to study in the UK.
The financial loss has been compounded by the rising cost of visa application for the UK, as the Home Office generated £9.3m in visa fees from refused applications over the last year.
Despite the clear spike in visa rejections, several universities have been unwilling to change their refund policies, with complaints that some are not adequately communicating the risk to students who are applying.
Stakeholders worry trust in the UK’s reputation is being eroded by these practices that are leaving both students and agent partners at risk.
A director of global recruitment at a UK university spoke to The PIE, saying: “The concern is that as institutions, agents and even students are placed under financial pressure, they can make worse decisions. This is a real threat to the UK’s reputation and relationships in key markets.”
