I just started tutoring on Preply, planned on visiting family in Russia sometime soon for a few weeks. I’ve searched for a concrete answer (I know that RU and BY flags aren’t on the website) and from what it seems like, you can’t use VPN while teaching, and it seems like Preply itself doesn’t work in these countries but again, I can’t find concrete proof. Will my account get terminated if I go online from RU? or should i work around with zoom/teams etc. and have students confirm lessons? Thanks 
I would write them directly (Preply) to ask this.
If you trust your students, do the classes via zoom or Google meet and just get your students to confirm manually. I wouldn’t log into Preply from Russia.
I’m usually on VPN and have taught from the USA, Mexico and UK on VPN. I think it’s probably more like, if you submit a Russian ID and are teaching from a supported country and then all the sudden you are on VPN that they get suspicious that you are in Russia.
But I also have a lot of classes each week and 5 stars, so it could be that for business reasons they don’t bother one person but they hold another persons account, or they only check for it during a certain startup period?
Most of all, it probably changes from time to time and they’d never declare what the exact policy is otherwise they draw a roadmap for people to sneak through the system.
You’ll be banned. Do what the other guy said usee zoom and have them confirm
Don’t teach while you’re there. If you do, use a stable vpn. If the site detects you’re in one of the prohibited countries, even if just for a moment, your account is automatically suspended. Then you have to wait for support to manual unblock it. It’s a major pain to do.
I wanted to start teaching in the spring and had to wait until I left Russia to do it. My vpn would freeze up and after having my account blocked twice I decided to just wait.
Can’t use a VPN while teaching?
I suppose it depends on which VPN you’re using as to whether or not they can detect you’re using one.
I use NordVPN and the few times that I get a problem with a site blocking my VPN address I just re-connect and get a new IP.
i just arrived to Russia and tried to connect with my tutor based in France. Cant’ even with VPN. any advice?
What did you end up doing?
Yeah, the more I think about it, the more I would rather just not touch it while there and do what you said, seems too risky but I could message them and see, thanks!
Fair, thanks for your advice! I just wondered because I’m not Russian (I’m from Hungary) and the details seem murky at best, but yeah it makes sense why they wouldn’t outline this :')
If you think Preply cares about stars or lots of teaching hours I think you’re mistaken. Lots of tutors who have taught thousands of lessons over several years who get banned for nothing.
Can you elaborate on ways to make it work?
The Swift sanctions are no casual matter, so maybe it’s within a certain range of Russia for the tutors residency that they start to pay attention? Or it pertains to the labor laws where your account is based?
Either way, best of luck. I get antsy when I travel but so far so good. I’m going to France for a week and can’t afford to place my account in jeopardy so I’m just blocking all the time off but it’s only 6 days.
According to reddit tho?
I figured it was a blanket ban on these countries but it seems to not be the case, I probably just won’t fuck around with it there because who knows what can happen 0.o to be fair I wouldn’t blame you for just blocking it off completely, less risky that way!
I’m pretty sure, based on how they treat me (also 5 stars, pulling in 3k+ after commission each month).
Whenever I have a small problem there’s always “impossible” to help me. So I think it’s actually true.