What Should a Tutor's Safeguarding Policy Actually Include?

A safeguarding policy document should do one job well: tell a parent, a child, and you — the tutor — exactly what happens if something goes wrong. That means five things, in writing: who is responsible (you, named, with a back-up contact), how to recognise a concern, what to do in the first five minutes after a disclosure, where to escalate it, and how you keep a record. Most tutors either skip the document entirely or copy a generic template that leaves the "who do I actually call" line blank — which is the one line that matters most when a child says something worrying halfway through a session.

Why the document itself is the point, not just the duties

A lot of advice aimed at tutors covers the legal duties — what the law expects you to do. Fewer cover the actual document: the thing you'd hand a parent, or open yourself, at 6pm on a Tuesday when you need it. A duty you can recite is not the same as a policy you can follow under pressure. The document exists so you don't have to improvise in the moment.

Treat it as a working reference, not a compliance exercise. It should be short enough to read in two minutes and specific enough that a first-time tutor with no formal training could follow it step by step.

What the document should actually include

1. A statement of intent. One paragraph: you take the safety and wellbeing of every child you tutor seriously, you follow safer-working practice, and you know how to respond to and report a concern. This sets the tone and gives a parent something to point to.

2. Who's responsible. For a sole-trader tutor, that's you — name yourself explicitly, and name a back-up (a partner, a colleague, or your tutoring agency's designated safeguarding lead if you work through one) for the situation where you're unreachable. A policy with no named person is a policy nobody can follow.

3. Recognising a concern. A short, plain list of what might indicate a child is at risk — unexplained changes in behaviour or mood, comments about home life that don't add up, physical signs, or a direct disclosure. You're not diagnosing anything; you're noticing and acting on what's in front of you.

4. What to do if a child discloses something to you. This is the section tutors most often leave out, and it's the one you'll actually use. In order: listen without interrupting; don't promise to keep it secret; don't investigate or ask leading questions; write down what was said as close to word-for-word as you can, as soon as the session ends; pass it on the same day.

5. Where to escalate. Three routes, named specifically so you're not searching for a number while anxious: your Local Authority Designated Officer (LADO) if the concern involves an allegation about you or another adult working with the child; the child's local authority children's social care team for a general welfare concern; the NSPCC helpline (0808 800 5000) if you're unsure which of the two applies or need advice before acting; 999 if a child is in immediate danger. Put the actual numbers in the document — not "contact the relevant authority."

6. Safer working practice. The rules you follow every session, written down: where sessions take place (a public or supervised setting for a first meeting, no closed-door one-to-ones with young children in private homes without a parent present or aware); how you handle online lessons (recording policy, which platform, camera-on expectations); your position on physical contact (none beyond what's clearly necessary and appropriate); and your policy on photography, social media, and personal contact details (no personal numbers, no direct messaging outside the platform or an agreed channel).

7. Record-keeping. A factual, dated log — kept separately from ordinary lesson notes — of any concern raised, what you did, and when. Store it securely and keep it for as long as your data protection obligations require, not indefinitely and not casually deleted either.

8. A review date. Safeguarding guidance changes — the Department for Education's Keeping Children Safe in Education framework is updated periodically, and your own practice will evolve. Put a date on the document and actually revisit it. An unreviewed policy from three years ago reads as decorative, not lived-in.

How this becomes visible credibility, not paperwork

A written safeguarding policy sitting in a folder does nothing for you. The same policy, referenced on your profile and backed by a verified DBS check, does something real: it's evidence a parent can actually weigh, not a claim they have to take on trust.

This is where Tutorwise's approach to credibility differs from an ordinary tutor directory. On Tutorwise, a tutor's credibility isn't a self-written bio a parent has to take at face value — it's a computed score built from CaaS (Credibility as a Service), which pulls together real, checkable signals: a verified DBS check, verified identity, qualifications, delivered outcomes, and reviews. A DBS check is one weighted signal within that score's Trust bucket, not a platform-wide guarantee — Tutorwise doesn't claim every tutor is checked, and it shouldn't, because that would be false. What it does instead is make the difference visible: a parent comparing two tutors can see which one has a verified DBS check and which doesn't, and that visibility is worth more to you than the document itself.

In practice, that means the safeguarding policy you write for your own protection is also a competitive signal. A tutor who can point to a written policy, a completed DBS check, and a verified profile is answering the question every parent is silently asking — "can I trust this person alone with my child?" — with evidence instead of reassurance.

Common mistakes that make a policy useless in the moment

Copying a generic template and never filling in the specifics. A downloaded template with "[insert designated safeguarding lead]" still showing is worse than no document at all — it signals the policy was never actually adopted.

Burying the escalation numbers in prose. If the LADO contact, the NSPCC helpline, and the 999 guidance are written into a paragraph rather than listed clearly, you'll waste time re-reading under pressure instead of acting.

No back-up contact. If you're the sole named responsible person and you're unreachable — on holiday, in another session, unwell — the policy has no route forward. Name someone else, even if it's just "contact [agency/colleague name] in my absence."

Treating record-keeping as optional. A concern you didn't write down is a concern you can't evidence later, whether that's for the local authority, an agency, or your own protection if a complaint is ever made against you.

Never revisiting it. A policy written once and forgotten drifts out of date with your actual working practice — a new online platform, a new tutoring location, a change in who your back-up is. The review date exists so that drift gets caught.

A concrete example

Say a Year 8 student mentions, mid-session, that things have been "rough at home lately" and gets visibly upset. You don't ask follow-up questions or press for detail. You acknowledge what they said gently, let the session finish naturally, and immediately afterwards write down exactly what was said, the date, and the context — while it's fresh, in your own words, without embellishment. Because your policy names a back-up contact and the LADO/children's social care distinction, you know within minutes whether this is a general welfare concern to flag to the local authority's children's social care team or something you should raise with the parent directly first. You're not guessing under pressure, because the document already made the decision for you in advance.

That's the entire point of writing the policy before you need it: the moment you actually need it is the worst possible moment to be drafting a response from scratch.

FAQ

Do I need a safeguarding policy if I only tutor online? Yes. Online sessions still fall under the same safer-working-practice expectations — camera and recording rules, no closed private messaging outside an agreed platform, and the same disclosure and escalation process if a concern comes up. The setting changes; the responsibility doesn't.

Is a safeguarding policy a legal requirement for a self-employed tutor? Requirements vary by how you work — through a school, an agency, or fully independently — but having a written policy is standard good practice for anyone working with children, and it's increasingly what parents and agencies expect to see, regardless of the exact legal threshold in your situation.

Who is my LADO and how do I find them? The Local Authority Designated Officer sits within the local authority where the child lives (or where you deliver tutoring, if that differs). A search for "[your local authority] LADO contact" will surface the current number — save it in your policy document rather than searching for it during an actual concern.

Does having a DBS check mean I don't need a safeguarding policy? No — they cover different things. A DBS check is a background check on you; a safeguarding policy is your plan for recognising and responding to a concern about a child. Tutorwise's credibility score treats them as separate, weighted signals, not substitutes for each other.

How often should I update my safeguarding policy? Review it at least once a year, and immediately after any change to your working setup — a new tutoring location, a new online platform, or a change in who your back-up contact is.

More in this series

• A Tutor's Safeguarding Duties: What the Law Actually Expects
• How to Get DBS-Checked as a Tutor (and Why It Wins Clients)
• How Tutorwise Scores Tutor Credibility: CaaS Explained
• How to Vet and Onboard Tutors for Your Agency