I get the same email half a dozen times a month. “I want to improve my spoken English. I’ve tried three apps. I know I’m wasting money. What should I actually pay for?”
This is the filter I send back. Five questions, blunt enough that they cut through marketing. I have answered them honestly for Iceforma at the end of the article — feel free to ask any other provider the same questions and see what they say.
1. Are the tutors native speakers? Show me their passports.
Online platforms have, for years, lazily called any English-speaking tutor "native". The market has earned the right to ask hard for proof. The actual question is: was this person born and raised in a country where English is the first language?
This matters for accent absorption, idiom and rhythm — three things you simply cannot pick up from a non-native instructor with the same fidelity, however skilled they are. A good Malaysian English teacher is still a brilliant ally for grammar and writing. But spoken fluency wants a native ear.
2. Will my tutor be the same person every week?
Continuity is the single biggest predictor of progress. A tutor who heard you stumble in week one is the tutor who can build week two’s lesson around fixing it. Platforms that rotate you through whoever is available are sub-optimising for their schedule, not your fluency.
If the answer is "we have hundreds of tutors and you can pick a different one each week", consider whether that is a feature or a bug.
3. How is progress measured — in numbers?
Streaks and badges are entertainment. CEFR levels (A1, A2, B1, B2, C1, C2) and IELTS / TOEFL bands are signals. A serious provider will tell you, at the start of the engagement, exactly where you are on one of these scales — and will tell you in writing every four weeks where you have moved to.
"Our learners feel more confident" is not a measurement. Ask for a sample report.
4. Are sessions recorded — and for how long?
If they are not recorded, you cannot review. If you cannot review, you cannot rehearse. If you cannot rehearse, fluency is being left on the table.
For adults, the ability to rewatch the five minutes of yesterday’s lesson where you stumbled — and rerun the corrected version five times before tomorrow — is worth more than another fifteen-minute lesson.
5. What happens if I am not happy?
A serious provider has a refund policy in writing on the website, not buried in a Terms PDF. Pro-rata refunds on unused sessions within the first thirty days is a fair industry benchmark. If they cannot do that, ask why.
How Iceforma answers
- Native? Yes — every tutor was born and raised in the UK, Ireland, US, Canada, Australia or NZ. We list this on each profile.
- Same tutor weekly? Yes. Continuity is the default. Switching is allowed if the fit is not right, but never random.
- Progress measured? Yes — CEFR band at week one, written one-page report every four weeks, signed off by the tutor.
- Sessions recorded? Yes — saved to your dashboard for the lifetime of your course.
- Refunds? Yes — pro-rata on unused sessions within thirty days, no questions asked. See the refund policy in full.
Whatever you choose, choose it with these five questions on the table. Your time and money deserve straight answers.
Erin McGuire is the founder and Head of Tutors at Iceforma Academy. She has been teaching English in Southeast Asia since 2011.