Trainer agreement for a training company

A training company's product is its courses, delivered by trainers it does not employ, and the agreement with each trainer has to protect the course materials, keep the delegates and the clients the company's, maintain the accreditation and quality the company sells, and pay the trainer per course without turning a freelance trainer into a member of staff. Where the trainer brings their own content, the agreement has to say who owns what. I draft that agreement, for the company or for the trainer, for a fixed fee of £595, delivered in five working days. Status is checked case by case with HMRC's Check Employment Status for Tax tool, and no agreement can guarantee an individual's status.

Who this is for

Training providers, apprenticeship and skills providers, professional development businesses and corporate training companies in England and Wales engaging freelance trainers, and trainers who deliver for training companies and want the terms right.

What matters in a trainer agreement

Course bookings and delivery

The agreement should be a framework under which the company offers course bookings (course, client, dates, venue or online, delegate numbers, fee) which the trainer may accept or decline, each a separate engagement, with the trainer's obligations for an accepted booking: preparation, delivery to the course outline and the company's standards, timekeeping, attendance records, assessments where the course includes them, and feedback to the company; cover for a trainer who cannot attend should be arranged through the company from its approved trainers.

Course materials, intellectual property and the trainer's own content

The company's course materials are its copyright under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 and should be licensed to the trainer for delivery of the company's bookings only, with no copying, adaptation or use for other clients; materials the trainer creates for the company's courses should be assigned to the company on payment under section 90, and materials the trainer brings from their own practice should be identified and licensed to the company for the booking with ownership retained, so that the two are not confused when the trainer leaves. Recording of sessions, and use of the trainer's name and image in marketing, should be agreed expressly.

Delegates, data and feedback

Delegates are the company's or its client's, and the agreement should say that the trainer may not solicit delegates or their employers for a reasonable period, may not use delegate lists, and handles delegate data (attendance, assessments, special requirements) as the company's processor under Article 28 of the UK GDPR, returning or deleting it after the course; feedback forms belong to the company, and where delegates are under eighteen or vulnerable the trainer needs the checks under the Safeguarding Vulnerable Groups Act 2006 regime that the agreement should require.

Accreditation, quality and the trainer's qualifications

Where the company's courses are accredited or regulated (awarding organisations, apprenticeship standards, professional bodies, funding rules), the agreement should require the trainer to hold the qualifications, occupational competence and registrations the accreditation requires, to comply with the awarding organisation's requirements on delivery and assessment, to take part in standardisation and observation, and to maintain continuing professional development, with the company entitled to observe sessions and to withdraw bookings where standards are not met; the company's quality obligations to the regulator cannot be delegated, and the agreement should give it the controls it needs without managing the trainer as an employee.

Status, substitution and the company's standards

A trainer who delivers for several companies and their own clients, decides how to teach within the course outline, uses their own equipment for online delivery and may decline bookings is self-employed, and the agreement should say so; a trainer on a fixed timetable, required to attend meetings and training days as a condition, following a scripted delivery and unable to decline is likely to be a worker under section 230 of the Employment Rights Act 1996 with rights under the National Minimum Wage Act 1998 and the Working Time Regulations 1998. Substitution is limited by accreditation (a substitute must be approved), which the status analysis has to accommodate, and where the trainer works through a limited company for a medium or large client the off-payroll working rules in Chapter 10 of Part 2 of the Income Tax (Earnings and Pensions) Act 2003 apply.

Fees, cancellations and ending

The agreement should state the fee per course day or per delegate, preparation fees for new courses, travel and accommodation for bookings away, invoicing after each course with interest under the Late Payment of Commercial Debts (Interest) Act 1998, the cancellation fee where the company or its client cancels a booking inside a stated period, the consequence where the trainer withdraws late, and ending the framework on notice with accepted bookings completed; the trainer should hold public liability and professional indemnity insurance, and liability should be capped at the fees for the booking under section 11 of the Unfair Contract Terms Act 1977.

What it costs

Consultancy or contractor agreement, £595. Drafted for your business. Five working days.

Template set for repeat use, £895. One master agreement plus a short-form schedule you can reuse for every engagement. Five working days.

Buying online forms the engagement on payment. The scope is what the consultancy and contractor agreements page describes, you accept the Terms of Service at checkout, and I email you within four working hours to get started. If you would rather ask something first, email me.

What you get

• A clear, express assignment of intellectual property to your business
• Confidentiality provisions that protect your business information
• Restrictive covenants drafted at a scope a court will uphold
• Clear treatment of status, so the arrangement is not accidentally something else
• Payment, deliverables and termination provisions that match how you work
• A reusable structure, so the next engagement costs you nothing

What is not included

• Employment status determinations and off-payroll working assessments, which need your accountant
• Tax advice
• Disputes with a contractor you have already engaged
• Immigration and right to work compliance

Questions I am often asked

A trainer wants to use our course materials for their own clients. Can they?

Not if the agreement licenses the materials for the company's bookings only, which it does. The company owns the materials and the trainer's licence ends with the engagement.

Our courses are accredited. Can we require trainers to attend standardisation meetings?

The agreement provides for it as a condition of delivering accredited courses, as a requirement of the accreditation rather than as the company managing the trainer. The company's quality obligations cannot be delegated.

A client cancelled a course two days before. Do we pay the trainer?

What the agreement says: a cancellation fee where the booking is cancelled inside the stated period, which the company recovers from the client under its own terms. The agreement sets the period and the fee.

Related guidance and services

• Consultancy and contractor agreements, £595, the service this page describes
• Contract review, £495
• Employment contracts and handbooks, £595
• Terms and conditions for a training provider

This page is general guidance for businesses in England and Wales, not advice on your own circumstances. Last reviewed: October 2026. Email geoffrey@caesar.co.uk.