How will the National Volunteer work?

The most important elements of a functioning system is the unambiguous identification of a subject; it follows that staff must perform photo ID checks. Subjects can only be matched if the information entered is correct, i.e. misspellings of a name or number will produce a false negative result.

We have chosen to use names and dates of birth from a valid passport rather than a passport number or a national insurance number for the following reasons;

• The use of a national insurance number is effectively defunct because there is no photographic ID that can substantiate that the national insurance number does indeed belong the volunteer presenting it
• The use of a passport number is also not ideal as the possibility of mis-typing a number is greater than that of misspelling a name
• Each country uses different identifiers within their passports and there is the chance, (admittedly small), that 2 numbers from different passports from different countries may be the same
• Passports have an expiry date and when a passport expires and a new one is issued the number in the passport changes and this provides a window of opportunity for the unscrupulous volunteer who may be trying to cheat the system
• Thus the use of the full name and date of birth, associated with a valid form of photographic ID is the safest way to try and counter the chances of over volunteering