Right to Work checks are the pre-employment checks that take place that confirm to employers that their prospective employees have the legal right work. With many changes to this legislation over recent times, Right to Work checks are going digital.
What is changing?
Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, there were temporary changes made to Right to Work checks to accommodate employers carrying out these checks during the pandemic.
Some of those changes were:
• Right to Work checks could be carried out over video calls
• Job applicants and existing workers could send scanned documents or a photo of documents for checks using email or a mobile app, rather than sending originals
On the 6th of April 2022, the government updated this legislation with a new digital Right to Work scheme to further facilitate online Right to Work checks and to replace the current COVID-19 guidance. This new digital scheme will come into force from the 1st of October 2022, and it will allow employers to remotely verify the identity of potential applicants with applicable documents using an Identity Service Provider (IDSP).
Organisation now have until the 30th September to ensure that they have the necessary processes in place to accommodate these guidance changes and to continue carrying out fully compliant Right to Work checks. This means that organisations will either need to introduce a full digital scheme, return to full manual checks, or choose a combination of both.
If an organisation cannot put the systems in place, then all checks must be completed manually. The result is that identity documents will not be authorised to be sent via online apps or email.
Why is this digital scheme being put in place?
The digitisation of onboarding services has been a key theme in recent years and even more so in 2022, and it will remain a focus for the foreseeable future as the onboarding landscape is changing.
When right to work guidance was updated in 2020 to accommodate for COVID-19, it was evident that the onboarding employee process was in need of a huge overhaul. Most organisations had to change their work processes to function remotely, and may have maintained this flexible approach.
So how can organisations comply?
Along with partnering with an IDSP as previously stated, organisations are also being urged to partner with GDPR specialists to ensure they remain fully compliant. The IDSP service provider that an organisation chooses to partner with must also comply with GPG45 standards.
What is an IDSP?
An IDSP is a certified identification document validation technology service provider that carries out digital identity checks on behalf of the organisation.
The verification process provided by an IDSP will validate the identity of the applicant and their documents remotely. Initially, the verification process will only cover British and Irish citizens, covering the vast majority of Right to Work checks.
What is GPG45?
The Good Practice Guide 45 (GPG45) was created by the UK Government Digital Services department. It allows organisations to verify the identity of customers, employers and other third parties. This provides organisations guidance on how to verify identities against a range of confidence levels. Whilst is may not be law, GPG45 has become the standard for digital identity checks acting as a foundation upon which organisations can carry out a digital identity check and ensure they follows the verification standards.
Our thoughts
With these changes on the way and the accommodations that are going to be needed for these changes, we are seeing a very mixed bag of opinions from our clients at the moment.
The vast majority are keen to utilise our digital Right to Work service from October as they are unable to revert to managing the process internally and see these the service to be a lost cost solution, which is great! Some clients are hopeful the deadline will be again pushed back a further six months giving them time to properly understand the impact of the change and create a more long-term solutions that better suits their business.
How can we help?
Here at CBS, we have vast experience in helping organisations complete their right to work checks with our employment screening services. With these new changes coming into place, it is important that they do not it impact your organisation.
If you want to find out more about how we can help you with these changes, contact us today on 01443 799900 or email us at info@cbscreening.co.uk.