Essays are the primary mode of assessment for many courses at Cambridge and the ‘essay crisis’ is something familiar to almost every Cambridge student: the coffee, the frantic reading and the working in the library until the early hours.

Yet there are some students and graduates of Oxford and Cambridge that are making serious money out of other people’s crises.

Oxbridge Essays is a company that was set up in 2006, and describes itself on its website as “the UK’s largest and leading provider of guaranteed Upper 1st, 1st Class and 2:1 essays

and dissertations, custom written by academics from leading UK universities”.

Anyone in need of an essay, review, project or dissertation can simply go onto the website and request an essay on their chosen topic, specifying the length of the essay and the timeframe within which they need it.

The company employ Oxbridge graduates and current students to write any essay that their customers request – the rates for which are something to behold.

A first class undergraduate History essay of 2,500 words will set you back £790, but a 2:2 only £360.

The prices also increase in relation to the time frame given, with an essay required for a fortnight’s time significantly less expensive than one needed the next morning, which is the fastest option the company offers.

The prices of the essays also differ according to subject, with a First Class Medicine essay worth £855 and PPS/PPE coming in at the most expensive at £890, whilst Natural Sciences essays are a relative steal at £550.

Dissertations and PhDs are, however, where the real money is, with a 7,000 word English Literature undergraduate dissertation costing a cool £1,680, with a 15,000 word History dissertation valued at £4,675.

A PhD is understandably the most expensive, with a full, “publishable” PhD worth an incredible £11,230.

Clients are able to choose the exact grade they would like ranging from a 2.ii to a high First which leads to the question of how they can guarantee grades.

To this question, Oxbridge essays answer: “By using some of the country’s finest academics we are able to provide our clients with their exact grade requirements.”

They go on to add: “Our writers are experienced academics and understand the requirements for work at all levels and grades, from As at A-level through undergraduate and Master’s 2.is; First and Upper Firsts to PhD pass and publishable material.”

Despite the exorbitantly high prices for essays, Varsity’s investigation shows that students will only earn a fraction of the sale price.

Speaking to a source at Oxbridge Essays, we were told that typically a student will be paid a rate of £70 per 1,000 words written. This equates to roughly 25-35% of the sale price of some essays.

The financial incentives behind working for Oxbridge Essays are clear, but its moral questionability is more complex: does it count as cheating?

The company are adamant that it does not, saying that “ordering a model essay or dissertation does not make you a cheat. In fact, it usually shows that you are a hard-working and conscientious student. The great majority of our customers have been let down by their university or experienced difficult personal circumstances. They are looking for expert private academic help to make sure that they still get the 2.i or First Class degree they deserve”.

Speaking to Varsity on the phone, a source at the firm insisted that writing for their company is not legal but agreed that there was a moral question involved with writing for their firm.

The university disagrees, however, and both Cambridge and Oxford have expressed strong

disapproval of the company in the past, defining the essays as plagiarism.

A spokesman for the University of Cambridge told Varsity: “We would strongly disapprove of present or former students writing essays for other people or using essays written by others. Not only is it cheating, or complicit with cheating, but it goes against the entire purpose of a university education, which is to develop one’s own ideas and skills, not buy them in from elsewhere. Cambridge students, in any case, have very heavy workloads and writing essays for other people would inevitably put their own progress at risk.”

Yet not everyone disagrees with the idea of selling your ideas to others: a student who wishes to remain anonymous told Varsity that “in the current economic climate we shouldn’t be limiting the job opportunities for graduates – we’ve all got huge student loans, we should just take what we can get”.

Not all students take this attitude, however, with Kate Henney, a first year at Emmanuel College, saying that she would be worried about someone else using her work as their own: “I really don’t like the idea of someone else getting the benefit of my hard work, and it defeats the point of a university education if you just use the skills you’ve worked on to help someone else cheat.”

The company emphasises that its services do not count as cheating as they state explicitly that the work is not to be submitted but merely used as research documents: “When used correctly, our model essays and dissertations are meant to be ‘learning aids’ which students use to improve their understanding of their university materials”.

Yet the company has no means of ensuring this, and ultimately the likelihood is that the students who are paying out such large sums of money will submit the essays as their own work, raising questions about intellectual property as well as plagiarism.

On to the question of legality and the company claims the services they provide are completely legal: “All services provided by Oxbridge Essays are 100 per cent legal.

“Legally, writing a model essay or dissertation is no different to writing a journal, newspaper article, speech or any other written material.”

Oxbridge Essays is part of a larger organisation, The Oxbridge Research Group, which describes itself as “the UK’s largest academic research company” offering other services such as document editing and Oxbridge personal statements. The Oxbridge Research Group claims to employ almost 2,000 academics from Oxford and Cambridge, suggesting that not everyone at the university shares the negative view of the organisation.

Despite   the condemnation of Oxbridge Essays by the university and most people’s views about cheating and plagiarism, it is clear that there is still both a market for the essays and people willing to work for them, due to the size of the financial rewards offered, something likely to increase in the current economic climate.

Have you ever written an essay for cash? If so, email news@varsity.co.uk anonymously with your story.