How we work
What happens to a request, from the day you send it to the day you get the report.
Step by step
- We check your requestWe make sure it's complete, the candidate has signed a consent and the documents are readable. If something's missing, we come back to you before we contact anyone.
- We work out who to askWe work out who issued the record and how that issuer takes requests. It might be a registrar's office, a council portal or an exam board.
- We send the requestWe use the issuer’s own procedure and follow the request up until the issuer answers or the closing date we agreed with you passes.
- We compareWe check the issuer’s reply against the candidate’s documents and mark anything that doesn't match.
- We reportYou get the result, a record of what the issuer said, and a short note of how we asked and when.
- We close the fileWe keep the candidate’s documents only as long as the request and any audit period we've agreed with you need them, then delete them.
Four possible results
Every line of a report ends in one of these.
Confirmed by issuerThe issuer confirmed the details listed in the report, and they match the documents you sent.
Not confirmedThe issuer says it has no matching record, or its record differs from the documents. The report says which, and what differs. A difference on its own doesn't prove fraud.
Waiting on issuerThe request is open and we're still following it up.
Unable to verifyThe issuer won't release the information, can't be reached, or didn't answer by the closing date we agreed. The report says which.
How long it takes
We don't publish a standard turnaround, because issuers differ too much. Before we start, we agree with you how long to pursue each request and when we'll update you. How fast the issuer replies is up to the issuer.