E-sign student contracts in compliance with Edutrust version 4
Quickly set up Zegal’s workflow platform to manage student contract e-Signing so that your PEI achieves full Edutrust certification.
EduTrust is a certification scheme in Singapore, specifically for private educational institutions (PEIs).
The scheme is administered by the Committee for Private Education (CPE), which is part of SkillsFuture Singapore (SSG).
EduTrust certification is aimed at ensuring that PEIs maintain high standards in areas like academic quality, student protection, and financial viability.
To ensure that your PEI maintains its Edutrust Certification status, you must use a fully compliant e-Signing system when you enroll new students or make any changes to their existing contracts.
Zegal is the only e-Signing platform that has been built ground up to ensure end-to-end compliance with every requirement of Edutrust version 4.2
Compliance made easy “Our institution transitioned to Zegal, and the ease with which we manage compliance is remarkable.”
What are the Edutrust version 4 student signing contract requirements?
The process for signing student contracts is very clearly proscribed in Edutrust version 4.2 If your PEI admissions team are missing any of the following steps, then you may well be in breach of your Edutrust Certification requirements. In particular you should check that your existing e-Signing solution fulfils ALL of the requirements of Item 4.2.1 which concerns student contracts, and states:
Describe/Show how you
- Execute a student contract during course admission. The student contract execution procedure shall provide for the following:
- Ensuring each student contract is meant for the admission of each student into one course
- Explaining the terms and conditions of the contract to each student and ensuring that each student fully understands them
- Ensuring that both you and the student acknowledge any amendment made
- Stipulating a cooling off period of at least 7 working days
- Signing a new contract or issuing an addendum to the existing contract for a student who wishes to repeat a module and when a course deferment or transfer request has been approved
- Ensuring that a breakdown of all fees (inclusive of any non-refundable fees, discounts/rebates and grants/funding given) are declared in the contract and marketing collaterals
- Ensure a copy of your student contract is made available for prospective students
- Review the student contract execution procedure for continual improvement.
What are the Edutrust version 4 student signing contract requirements?
The Zegal Edutrust Platform has been built ground-up to ensure that it ticks every one of the Edutrust 4.2 requirements, and is future proof so that as those requirements evolve over time, you can be sure that the Zegal platform will continue to adapt so that it is remains 100% compliant:
Zegal’s unique, automatic contract summary feature ensures each student has understood what they are signing and that your PEI is 100% Edutrust version 4.2 compliant.
The key features below show how Zegal outperforms other standard e-Signing solutions, the use of which in an Edutrust compliant setting would be risky.
| Edutrust version 4.2 compliance requirements | Zegal | PDF E-Signing tools |
| Explaining the terms and conditions of the contract to each student and ensuring that each student fully understands them | ✔ this feature is unique to Zegal and cannot be fulfilled using other E-sigining platforms. | ❌ |
| Ensuring that both you and the student acknowledge any amendment made | ✔ | ✔ Available, but only on expensive, enterprise-grade e-Signing plans. |
| Signing a new contract or issuing an addendum to the existing contract for a student who wishes to repeat a module and when a course deferment or transfer request has been approved | ✔ Zegal automatically creates the amended contract using information from the existing contract and stores the contract in your student file alongside the original. | ❌ |
| Ensure a copy of your student contract is made available for prospective students | ✔ The student automatically receives a signed copy to their inbox and PEI has an audit trail of the send receipt. | ✔ Available, but only on expensive, enterprise-grade e-Signing plans. |
“Having automatic contract renewal reminders means that we never miss signing deadlines and have to chase late fees“ EAIMS Admissions Team
In addition, the Zegal platform provides the following feature-set that offers enterprise-level features to PEIs ensuring you the same level of security that law firms in Singapore and globally expect from the Zegal name.
In the table below, we have compared ourselves to the top tier Enterprise plan offered by DocuSign, which does not comply with the Edutrust 4.2 standard in full and we estimate would be between 5 and 10 times the annual cost of using Zegal depending on the size or your PEI.
Standard e-Signing packages and PDF e-Signing tools will not offer a fraction of the feature sets that are listed below and will not support integrations or automations. Importantly, PDF e-Signing tools will not provide automatic Edutrust compliance. Only Zegal guarantees this level of compliance.
| Zegal | DocuSign enterprise plan | |
| eSignatures | Unlimited | Up to 100 envelopes/year (more at additional fees) |
| Documents | Unlimited | Up to 100 envelopes/year (more at additional fees) |
| Negotiations and approvals | ✔ | ✔ |
| Recipient analytics and audit logging | ✔ Zegal audit logging is fully compliant with version 4.2 of Edutrust | ✔ |
| Custom branding | ✔ | ✔ |
| Basic and advanced fields | ✔ | ✔ |
| Bulk send | ✔ | ✔ |
| Forms created and managed for you | ✔ | ❌ |
| Signer attachment | ✔ | ✔ |
| Automatic contract renewal reminders | ✔ | ❌ |
| Document design templates | ✔ | ❌ |
| Document editor | ✔ | ❌ |
| Edutrust version 4.2 compliant audit trail | ✔ | ❌ |
| CRM and document storage integrations | ✔ Integrations both upstream and downstream included without extra cost. | Additional purchase fees for each integration |
| Support | Local L1, L2 and L3 support from 9am-midnight Asian hours | Premium support |
Compliance made easy “Our institution transitioned to Zegal, and the ease with which we manage compliance is remarkable.”
How does Zegal support Edutrust Certification Compliance
How does Zegal improve the efficiency of the contract signing process?
Zegal is designed as a plug and play solution that can either work standalone or together with your existing IT and internet solutions to deliver 100% Edutrust compliance and also create massive efficiencies when your team is sending out 1000+ contracts in any year.
Zegal integrates with almost any existing software your team is using. Most commonly these are CRMs like Salesforce, or Hubspot; and document or university management systems. In fact we can plug Zegal into any system that has an API.
“Having automatic contract renewal reminders means that we never miss signing deadlines and have to chase late fees“ EAIMS Admissions Team
Two of the most common integrations that PEIs use for are set out below:
USE CASE 1: Creating contracts for bulk sending from a CRM or a spreadsheet
Data in a CRM or a spreadsheet – however your admissions team currently stores student data, you can connect Zegal directly to that source. Zegal will then automatically pick up the information and complete the contract questionnaire, and add the email addresses for e-Signing.
Your team can review or make changes to the draft contract in Zegal before it is sent if needed.
USE CASE 2: Creating contracts via your student portal
