Frequently asked questions (FAQs)

DBS checks do not form part of the NPPV vetting process. If required, these checks must be completed by your organisation during your on-boarding process.

BPSS checks must be completed by your organisation during your onboarding process, these comprise of verifications of the applicants (i) Identity, (ii) Employment/Academic history for (as a minimum) 12 months, (iii) Nationality/Immigration status (including right to work in the UK), (iv) Criminal record check. 

Warwickshire Police only complete the criminal record check as part of the vetting process.

The minimum age for clearance is 16. The applicant must have an NI number to submit them for clearance, this is generated at age 16. Usually, under 18s are only permitted to work under work placement or apprenticeship in which case the applicant would require right to work checks during your usual onboarding process.

The residency criteria is available on residency appeal form. Best practice would be to consider this during the interview and onboarding stage. If they do not meet the criteria, please refrain from submitting an application.

If your applicant has been rejected during quality checking as they do not meet the residency criteria, they may meet the grounds for appeal.  The grounds for appeal are available on residency appeal form. 

If your applicant would like to submit a residency appeal, please advise them to email the vetting unit with their completed residency appeal form, providing full details, including dates they were out of the UK, the location and the reason for their visit.  

The appeals are heard every month and you will be notified of the outcome and whether the application can be proceeded with.

Warwickshire Police’s core purpose is for National NPPV vetting and any applicants requiring SC or CTC only should not be subjected to NPPV vetting. We work to the College of Policing APP and without a Police requirement we don’t have a valid reason to vet applicants. We do appreciate that you may have Government projects requiring SC and that some projects cross over with Police forces.

Please refer to our advertised Vetting Rates (April 2025), if a quote is still required, please email the vetting unit advising the number of applications you require, the level of clearance, and which service you wish to raise the applications under (standard or premium).

An applicant’s NPPV clearance can be transferred to your organisation if it was completed by Warwickshire Police, also subject to a request being received within 6 months (for NPPV) and 12 months (for SC) of their leaving date from their previous employer/ sponsor. To request the transfer, please complete the transfer request form with your applicant and email the vetting unit with your request.

We no longer accommodate PO numbers from 03/06/2024.  Card payment at the point of creation is required.  You will now find a basket tab on your portal where you can pay for your applications.

Please review our self service guide to card pre payment for further guidance on this process.

If you are not able to gain access to a company credit card yourself, you are able to add a new portal user who will only have financial responsibilities.  Please have a look at our updated authorised portal user request form.  If you require a new authorised portal user, please email the vetting unit with this request.

We accept Visa, Mastercard Debit/ Credit, and American Express. We are not currently accepting Diners Club, Discover, JCB, or Union Pay. We are also unable to accept CHAPS, BACS, or cheques.

Payment confirmation will be sent to the email address requested on GOV.UK PAY, once successful payment has been made. If this is required, please liaise with the payee user for your organisation.

You can choose to pay for multiple applications in the basket at once, which means you will receive one receipt for multiple applications and they will each have the same payment reference number, or you can pay for applications individually so that you have a receipt per application and each application has its own payment reference number.

We would advise going forward with the option which would work best for yourself, your records, and your finance team.

If you are unsure of the process, please refer to the Self service guide to card pre-payment.

Under the web applications tab the statuses can change from Pending to Completed to Expired.

• Pending = with your applicant.
• Completed = with us to quality check and either reject for further information or import, the email you receive does state this.
• Expired = your applicant did not complete their application within the 90 day expiry date.  You will need to resubmit and pay for a new application.  Unfortunately,  you will no longer be eligible for a refund.

Applications can move from pending, to completed multiple times.  If you are seeing this consistently with the same applicant, please direct them to our advice for vetting applicants tile, where they will find lots of useful guidance, video guides, and responses to FAQs, to help them complete their application.

Applicants have 90 days to complete their application form.  Authorised portal users no longer have the reset expiry function on their portal; therefore, it is important that you ensure your applicants complete their application forms within their 90 day time frame.  The webform will automatically expire after 90 days, requiring a new application to be raised and paid for.  We are unable to issue refunds for expired applications.  Refunds requested prior to the expiry date will be eligible for a partial refund, as outlined in our pricing structure.  To request a refund, please follow Guidance Notes - Refund Request - April 2025. 

We are unable to supply a copy of the application form to company sponsors as this contains personal information. We will only provide a copy to the applicant directly upon request. If required, please advise your applicant to email the vetting unit. Applicants can download and/ or print a copy of their application PRIOR to submitting this on the portal.

We are pleased to share that after ongoing efforts to improve our SLA performance, we are now processing all new applications within our published SLAs (subject to third party checks).  All published SLAs relate to the NPPV element only.  Please refer to our Vetting Rates (April 2025) to see our SLAs for both the standard and premium service.  

We are still unable to provide a progress update on any applications prior to their SLA for both standard and premium applications.

We are unable to send emails advising when an application is cleared, so we recommend you monitor your portal for applicants that have moved to the clearances tab. 

If you have not yet generated the application, this is available to select from the application drop-down menu on the portal. (Please select the required NPPV level with the prefix of PREMIUM.)

If you have already generated an application but your applicant has not yet completed their application, you will need to wait until the application is showing under your ‘in progress’ tab.

If the applicant has completed their application and it is showing under your ‘in progress’ tab, please email the vetting unit providing the applicants full name and an identifier such as DOB and/ or NI number. We will contact you with the next steps.

Guidance notes on how to request a refund can be found in Guidance Notes - Refund Request - April 2025.

If you require a new authorised portal user to be set up or removed from our system, please complete Authorised Portal User Request Form and email the vetting unit with your request.  Requests will only be actioned upon receipt from an existing authorised portal user.  We recommend a minimum of two people have access to the portal.  Please notify us when an authorised portal user is leaving so that we can ensure our system is up to date.

Only authorised portal users have access to the portal.  Password sharing is strictly prohibited, and if this becomes apparent, accounts may be deleted.  If you require to be set up as an authorised portal user, please see above.  The link to the portal is WPC Core-Vet Portal (corevetconnect.co.uk)  If you have forgotten your password, or are experiencing difficulties on the portal, please email the vetting unit

It was agreed from 1^st October 2024, we would limit the number of applications we accept each month. Once this ceiling has been reached, you will be unable to raise any further applications until it resets on the 1^st day of the following month.

If the portal has closed to applications, but you feel you have an urgent operational need which cannot wait until the 1^st of the next calendar month, please complete, the Urgent Operational Need Request Form and email the vetting unit with your request. 

To facilitate an organisation name change, you will need to email the vetting unit with the below information on your company letterhead. 

Please provide the following:

• Current organisation name 

• New organisation name 

• Date the changes came into effect 

• Company registration number 

• Registered address 

• Correspondence address 

• Contact telephone number 

• Invoice email address (may not be applicable to your organisation) 

Please also review your current authorised portal users and submit the Authorised Portal User Request Form with the letterhead if you wish to add or remove any users. 

We are using a dynamic approach to review and manage the demand for our service against our SLAs, with the aim to significantly improve our service by the end of the financial year.

All organisations are set to 5 applications per month. If you believe your requirements will exceed 5, we will require you to complete our Forecast 2025-2026. 

Once this has been received, it will be taken to the management team for review, and limits will be discussed with you shortly afterward. Please send your completed forecast form to [email protected]. 

Our system imports names exactly as the applicant has completed this on their application, whether that be incorrectly spelt, missing any part of their name or input the incorrect way round. We do not request their ID and it is the responsibility of the applicant to double check their application before submitting this to us.

We would also encourage you to quality check your portal and should you notice any errors, please contact the vetting unit with their FULL name, correctly spelt and confirmation you have seen their ID documents.

Please email the vetting unit providing the applicants full name and an identifier such as DOB and/ or NI number and we will make the necessary adjustment to our system. If this is a bulk request, please export a spreadsheet from your portal and submit this to us, where possible, adding the applicants DOB and/ or NI number to the spreadsheet. Please note, bulk requests will have a longer response time than normal for completion.

Please note reviews are no longer required annually. Our reviews process is changing and will be communicated in due course. In the meantime, if an applicant is showing as due for a review under the reviews tab on your portal, please generate the security review, if your applicant does not appear under your reviews tab, you do not need to do anything at this time. 

A guide of what constitutes a change of circumstances can be found in Guidance Notes - Change of Personal Circumstances. 

You will find guidance on how to raise a change of circumstances form on behalf of your applicant in the Self-Service Guide.  

If the applicant is taking a sabbatical, not exceeding 12 months, clearance may be suspended.  Please email the vetting unit

Please generate a Change of Circumstances form via your portal prior to and upon return of your applicant, we may be able to suspend the clearance, not exceeding 12 months. (Self-service guide to Core-Vet).

Renewing a clearance is actioned in the same manner as a new application, please generate a new application via the portal. 

We recommend you submitting this 8-12 weeks ahead of their current clearance expiry date. For further guidance, please refer to the Self-Service Guide.

An SC/ CTC upgrade can only be requested if the applicant holds an existing NPPV clearance (NPPV2 Full for CTC, NPPV3 for SC) with Warwickshire Police, sponsored by your organisation.  The cost of a CTC upgrade is £199.  The cost of an SC upgrade is £259.  SC/ CTC upgrades are not currently available to request via the portal.  Please email the vetting unit providing the applicants full name and an identifier, such as DOB and/ or NI number.  We will contact you with the next steps. 

An SC/ CTC share or transfer can only be requested if the applicant holds an existing NPPV clearance (NPPV2 Full for CTC, NPPV3 for SC) with Warwickshire Police, sponsored by your organisation.  The cost of a CTC share or transfer is £199.  The cost of an SC share or transfer is £259.  SC/ CTC shares and transfers are not currently available to request via the portal.  If required, please complete SC Transfer or Share Request Form with your applicant and email the vetting unit with your request.  We will contact you with the next steps.

If there is less than two years left to run on the clearance, we would normally recommend requesting an SC/ CTC upgrade rather than requesting a share or transfer.  

Guidance notes on how to request an ID card can be found in Guidance Notes - ID Card Request - April 2025.