As a mandatory part of your compliance, your DBS (formally CRB) is crucial to the recruitment process, but recently, areas of the UK have been experiencing delays in their return. So why is this?

A vast majority of delayed DBS’ are being held at stage 4 (records held by the police), with the London Met Police being the most severely affected in the country, due to a shocking backlog of records still being dealt with. At the end of 2015, more staff were employed and trained in an attempt to tackle the backlogged applications still not dealt with but with so many records to check, and more coming in every day, even the new workers are struggling.

As an agency, we cannot enquire about a delayed DBS until it has been held at stage 4 for 60+ days. Therefore, we highly recommend joining the DBS Update Service as soon as you receive your disclosure through. This will prevent any future delays as your DBS will roll over each year provided you renew your Update Service registration annually.

If you have any further questions regarding your DBS application, please speak to your dedicated Consultant or Clinical Governance Officer.