New filtering rules

From 28 November 2020, the filtering rules for Standard and Enhanced DBS checks are changing. These changes are the result of a Supreme Court Judgment which identified that some elements of the existing filtering rules were disproportionate. Legislation has been changed, and from 28 November, DBS certificates will disclose criminal records according to this new legislation.

This means that the Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) will no longer disclose youth reprimands, youth warnings, or youth cautions. We will also no longer automatically disclose all convictions where an individual has more than one conviction – instead, each individual conviction will be assessed against the appropriate rules.

These new filtering rules will be applied to all certificates processed from 28 November onwards. Any certificate produced prior to this date, will be in line with the previous filtering rules.

More information about these guidelines, can be found in the following filtering guides:

DBS filtering guide

Filtering rules for DBS certificates