As an Accredited Body with the Australian Criminal Intelligence Criminal Commission (ACIC) National Police Checking Service (NPCS), we received official communication from the ACIC regarding processing delays for applications in receiving their Nationally Coordinated Criminal History Check, commonly known as a police check.
The Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission is responsible for facilitating the National Police Checking Service (NPCS or Service) in partnership with State and Territory police by managing the system that organisations use to submit police checks.
The NPCS is currently experiencing an unprecedented demand for police checks. Although the ACIC and respective Police agencies continue to process police checks, delays are being experienced nationally. This processing delays impacts checks that are referred for manual review. Some referred checks that normally take up to 10 business days to complete are taking upwards of 1-month to complete.
Link to the NPCS Official Notification of Check Processing Timeframes
Please note that a delayed police check is in no way an indicator that an applicant has any criminal history to be disclosed. The ACIC strongly urges employers not to discriminate against applicants who are experiencing delays in receiving their check.
Clients or applicants wishing to follow up the status of their check should continue to follow up with VerifyNow (Accredited Body) directly.
We appreciate your patience and understanding. We will continue to keep our clients updated.
