Safeguarding

This platform connects adults to children.

That is the whole reason the checks below exist, and why they are built into the booking itself rather than bolted on as a policy document. A rule that is only written down is a rule that gets skipped on a busy day.

The gate

A booking with a minor is refused unless the check is verified.

Not flagged, not warned about — refused. The same function runs on every booking request, and it is deliberately built to fail towards refusing rather than towards allowing.

1

Unknown age is treated as a child

If we cannot establish how old the student is, the check is required. The safe assumption is the restrictive one.

2

An unreadable date of birth is treated as a child

Corrupt or unparseable data does not fall through to “adult”. It fails the same way a missing check does.

3

Pending is not verified

An application that has been submitted but not yet granted does not open the gate. Only a confirmed check does.

4

Expired fails exactly like absent

A check that has lapsed carries no more weight than one that was never provided.

When a check lapses

An expiry is not just a status change. It moves the bookings.

A tutor can pass every check on Monday and have their clearance withdrawn on Tuesday while holding accepted bookings for the next month. Marking the check expired is not enough on its own, because those bookings already exist and nothing re-runs the gate over a booking that was accepted while the check was still valid. So a revocation does the whole thing at once:

The profile is delisted

Immediately, so nobody new can book them while the situation is resolved.

Future lessons with children are cancelled

Free to the family, and not counted against the tutor's reliability — this is not a cancellation they chose.

Families are told

Honestly, and without stating the reason. A withdrawn check is not a finding of wrongdoing, and checks are sometimes withdrawn for reasons that are unrelated or later overturned.

Lessons that already happened are left alone. Cancelling a lesson retrospectively rewrites history and strips a tutor of hours they legitimately earned. If there is a concern about a past lesson, that is an incident to investigate, and there is a way to raise it below.

Alongside the check

The rest of it

Contact details stay masked

Phone numbers and email addresses are not exchanged until a booking is accepted. Messages run through Chalkden until then.

A university email is confirmed

With a one-time code. That is what the “Monash student” line on a profile actually means — nothing more, and we do not claim more.

Reviews require a completed lesson

Only a lesson that was booked, taught and paid for can be reviewed, so a review cannot be left by someone who was never there.

Concerns reach a person

The report form is for people with an account, so a report can be tied to the booking it is about. Without one, email hello@chalkden.com — it reaches the same person. Serious reports are escalated rather than triaged away.

What we do not claim

We verify and display each tutor's Working with Children Check. We have not vetted anyone ourselves, and we do not run identity checks beyond reviewing the documents a tutor supplies. You can confirm any check directly with the Victorian register, and we would rather you did.

If something concerns you about a tutor, a lesson or a message, tell us.

Report a concern →