A Sydney higher education provider has sought to charge students thousands of dollars in return for "internships" at prestigious consulting firm PricewaterhouseCoopers, Fairfax Media can reveal.

Top Education Institute, headquartered in the University of Sydney's biomedical sciences building in Sydney's inner west, circulated advertisements targeting Chinese international students on social media app WeChat last week, spruiking the opportunity to "work closely with PwC partners" in a program with a "1 per cent admission rate in Australia".

Top Education staff told prospective applicants the "internship" program would cost $2800, sparking anger from students concerned that the world's largest professional services firm was selling work placements to the highest bidder, rather than based on merit.

But the advertisements misrepresented what was actually a two-week training course, the companies now say.