BIIAB has been stripped of powers to award security industry qualifications in an “unprecedented action” that puts an estimated £805,000 of qualification-fee income at risk. On Tuesday, the government’s Security Industry Authority (SIA) gave BIIAB 20 working days’ notice that it would terminate its recognition agreement after intelligence-led investigations, including unannounced inspections, uncovered “serious examples” of malpractice among BIIAB-approved training providers. The regulator found “serious and persistent material breaches” of BIIAB’s obligations which were “not capable of being remedied”. It follows Ofqual’s decision earlier this month to block the awarding organisation from registering new learners on three security qualifications. The SIA’s termination marks a significant escalation, withdrawing BIIAB’s approval across all five of its licence-linked awards. BIIAB, a subsidiary of Skills and Education Group, must immediately stop registering new learners on any of its five SIA-linked qualifications and cannot issue any qualifications after August 10. Qualifications awarded by BIIAB before that deadline will continue to be accepted by the SIA. The SIA told FE Week that BIIAB had failed to undertake necessary quality-assurance activity, keep and maintain appropriate records, and co-operate with its monitoring and auditing procedures. “Extensive work was undertaken by our quality assurance investigation teams, including multiple unannounced visits to BIIAB’s training providers, following information reported by whistleblowers and employers,” a spokesperson said. The regulator declined to disclose detailed findings but said information had been passed to relevant authorities “where appropriate”. A BIIAB spokesperson said the awarding organisation was “disappointed” by the termination notice. They said: “We continue our efforts behind the scenes, and it is deeply frustrating that this ongoing work has not been acknowledged or allowed to embed.” They added the matters related to a “small number” of BIIAB qualifications and did not reflect or “involve” the group’s wider operations or governance. “As an organisation, we are committed to actively working with both SIA and Ofqual. Quality assurance, our customers and their learners remain our highest priority. “We will be working with all parties concerned to provide clarity on the next steps for learners.” An SIA spokesperson added: “The SIA, Ofqual and BIIAB will be meeting on a regular basis to ensure that there is an orderly conclusion for learners. BIIAB have an ongoing obligation to Ofqual to ensure that they protect the interests of learners.” £805,000 of earnings at risk The termination covers BIIAB’s level 2 qualifications for door supervisors, security officers and CCTV operators, alongside door supervisor and security officer refresher awards. FE Week analysis of Ofqual data found BIIAB issued around 26,700 certificates across those five qualifications in England in the year to March 2026. These included 18,100 certificates for the main door supervisor award, 6,660 for its refresher qualification and 1,485 for the CCTV operator award. A further 380 security officer refresher certificates were issued, alongside fewer than 50 for the main security officer qualification. Applying BIIAB’s published per-learner training-provider charges suggested the five qualifications had an annual value of around £805,000 in England, before separate charges paid by centres. The estimate does not represent confirmed BIIAB income because it is based on certificates rather than registrations and does not account for any discounts or alternative pricing arrangements. BIIAB listed a £31.50 provider fee for the main door supervisor, security officer and CCTV qualifications, and £26.50 for both refresher awards on its website before its pages promoting the courses were taken down. The figure is equivalent to roughly one quarter of the £3.17 million turnover reported in BIIAB’s latest standalone accounts, covering the year to August 2024. The five SIA-linked awards also accounted for about half of all BIIAB certificates issued in England during the period. BIIAB’s accounts for the year to August 2025 have not yet been published. Every affected centre faces inspection Ofqual first intervened in September 2025, requiring BIIAB to conduct additional checks before releasing results for three security qualifications. It issued a formal direction on July 2 preventing new registrations for the main door supervisor, door supervisor refresher and security officer awards. The full legal direction, published this week, states that Ofqual determined BIIAB “has failed, and is likely to continue to fail” to comply with its conditions of recognition. Ofqual’s direction requires BIIAB to commission an independent review of every centre connected to its level 2 door supervisor, door supervisor refresher and security officer qualifications. The review must include a physical, unannounced inspection of each centre, checks on staff and invigilators, and scrutiny of potential malpractice or maladministration. Ofqual must approve the reviewer and terms of reference before the work begins, and can accompany inspectors on visits. BIIAB is also prohibited from issuing results to existing learners until it has completed a compliance pro-forma for each cohort. The checks must cover assessment conditions, authentication of learners’ work, invigilation, previous quality-assurance activity and any outstanding malpractice or maladministration cases. Ofqual can require results to be withheld if it is not satisfied with the assurances provided. The September controls applied to the same three security qualifications had required similar cohort-level assurances before results could be released. Ofqual said BIIAB was drawing up a plan, required under its conditions of recognition, to ensure learners were not disadvantaged. It said BIIAB and Skills and Education Group Awards were regulated as separate legal entities, but confirmed it was “considering the impact” of the regulatory action in light of the relationship between them. Ofqual declined to say which conditions BIIAB had breached, whether it had complied with controls imposed last September or whether further sanctions, such as financial penalties, were being considered, citing “ongoing regulatory action”. It said it continued to monitor BIIAB’s wider qualifications and assessment activity. Five security awarding organisations remain BIIAB was one of six awarding organisations approved by the SIA in a market that issued 158,000 licence-linked qualifications during 2025-26. The SIA said it would work with Ofqual and the five remaining organisations to ensure there was sufficient capacity for learners and training centres. Operation RESOLUTE, the SIA programme behind the inspections, has targeted poor standards, malpractice and fraud in commercial security training over the past 18 months. The SIA carried out 24 unannounced inspections across training centres in England during the past month, although it has not disclosed how many involved BIIAB providers. It said Operation RESOLUTE had resulted in learners’ qualifications being revoked and licences suspended where they were found to have been obtained fraudulently. A number of investigations into specific allegations of training malpractice were under way at any one time, but the SIA did not say whether any qualifications or licences linked to BIIAB had been revoked or suspended. Tim Archer, the SIA’s executive director of licensing and standards, said it was “critical to public safety” that frontline security operatives obtained licences through legitimately earned qualifications. Amanda Swann, Ofqual’s executive director for delivery, said the case demonstrated that regulators were working together to tackle malpractice. “Those that do not take these matters seriously will be held to account,” she said.