AccessNI is a branch in the Department of Justice. It's role is to process applications from members of the public and organisations who require a criminal record check for employment purposes.
AccessNI issues 3 types of check and these are laid out below.
In England & Wales this is handled by the Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) and in Scotland by Disclosure Scotland. All use the same information on criminal records.
Access NI Filtering allows the removal of some old and minor convictions and non-court disposals from Standard and Enhanced Access NI certificates after a period of time. It does not mean these items are removed from your criminal record, just that they are not shown on your Access NI certificate.
What can be filtered?
Convictions older than 11 years and cautions older than 6 years for non-specified offences will be automatically filtered from a Standard or Enhanced Access NI check prior to its issue.
What cannot be filtered?
If you believe information disclosed on your Access NI certificate is not relevant to the role you are applying for or it is not proportionate for the information to be disclosed, you can raise a dispute with the Independent Reviewer within Access NI and ask that the conviction information be removed from your certificate, even if the offence is specified or resulted in a prison sentence. Your conviction must be spent before you can raise a dispute. If the Independent Reviewer believes that it has not been proportionate to disclose a conviction on your Access NI check, they will reissue the certificate with the conviction information removed. Appeals should be lodged within 90 days of receiving your certificate and are free of charge. You can lodge your appeal here; https://www.nidirect.gov.uk/services/accessni-certificate-dispute-form
If you’re convicted of an offence abroad and the foreign authorities share this information with UK police, this offence could appear on your criminal record in Northern Ireland. AccessNI will not filter an offence if it is equal to any on the specified list.
IMPORTANT - If the individual was under 18 when they received any non-court disposal, these will now be referred to the Independent Reviewer for consideration, even if these fell into in to a specified category.
Specified offences are serious crimes that will always appear on an AccessNI check no matter when the crime occurred or the offender’s age when convicted.
Specified offences include:
