The Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) helps employers in England and Wales make safer recruitment decisions. A number of roles, especially those involving children or vulnerable adults, are entitled to a criminal record check. Their aim is to help protect children and vulnerable adults by providing a first-class service to support organisations recruiting people into positions of trust.

An enhanced DBS disclosure is for positions involving greater contact with children or vulnerable adults. In general, the type of work will involve regularly caring for, supervising, training or being in sole charge of children or vulnerable people.

In addition to the information provided on a standard DBS disclosure, the enhanced DBS disclosure involves an additional check with the police, who check if any other information is held on file that may be relevant (for instance, investigations that have not led to a criminal record). The police decide what (if any) additional information will be added to the disclosure.

A basic DBS disclosure only checks an individuals’ ‘unspent convictions’. It does not check spent convictions, cautions, warnings and reprimands, children’s barred list, adult’s barred list or other relevant information held by the police forces.

These checks cannot be obtained by members of the public directly, they are only available to organisations. This is because identification needs to be thoroughly checked and confirmed by an unrelated individual.

The DBS service enables organisations in the public, private and voluntary sectors to make safer recruitment decisions by identifying candidates who may be unsuitable for certain work, especially that involve children or vulnerable adults. An enhanced DBS provides families with more peace of mind that the nanny is suitable and able to look after their children.

The individual applies to the Disclosure and Barring Service with their application countersigned/confirmed by the organisation. The applicant's criminal record is then accessed from the Police National Computer (PNC), as well as checked against lists of people considered unsuitable to work with children and vulnerable people maintained by the Independent Safeguarding Authority and others; these include the ISA Children's list, the ISA Adults' list and List 99. Copies of completed disclosures are sent to the applicant.

When nannies register with Forget-me-not-nannies and they do not hold a valid enhanced DBS disclosure, we offer to apply for one for them. We complete the online application form together and Forget-me-not-nannies’ checks and confirms their identification through seeing the required documents (see below Documents needed to apply for an enhanced DBS disclosure). We then submit the application to our DBS umbrella company. Forget-me-not nannies will check on the DBS disclosure regularly and keep nannies updated on the current status of their application. Once the online DBS disclosure is returned to Forget-me-not nannies, we email the nannies a copy to show at interviews until their papercopy arrives.

We charge £70.

Forget-me-not nannies applies for DBS disclosures online, through an umbrella company. The online disclosure usually comes back within a week but can take up to 4-8 weeks. The papercopy will then be printed and sent to the applicant.

Every three years, unless you have applied for the update service. This helps to ensure that disclosures are up to date with recent information.

No. One of the reasons that families use nanny agencies to find them a nanny is so they know that the nanny is clear of all criminal convictions and suitable and able to work with their children. Forget-me-not nannies cannot allow nannies to start work without this check being complete.

You will need the full addresses of where you have lived within the last five years.

You also need to provide a valid national insurance number.

Please follow this link to see which other documents are required when applying.