It is a requirement of RDA Membership that volunteers are CRB (Criminal Record Bureau) (and equivalents in Scotland - CRBS and Northern Ireland - ACCESS NI) checked. CRB Checks are provided free of charge, however, from 1 April 2010 an RDA administration fee of £8 per check was levied.

Currently this applies to

• All new volunteers*
• All Child/Vulnerable Persons Protection Officers (CVPO)
• All Group Instructors

RDA National is an umbrella body and can carry out checks for RDA Groups. There is no requirement to use RDA National to complete a check, if the RDA Group is registered with the CRB or has a more convenient local method of completing the check.

In order to be able to complete a check the Group must have a Child/Vulnerable Person Protection Officer in place.

* - there may be some exemptions to this, in the case of short-term volunteers, or those coming to an RDA Group through a third party (eg school students). For more information, please contact RDA.

For the latest information on CRB and ISA please see below, or the News section. 

The new ACCESS NI Forms are available to download from the Useful Resources page found in the Member Groups section.  Alternatively you can complete your Application on-line, print, have your ID verified and submit in the normal way.

Information regarding the new CRB forms can be found on the CRB website:

     Form completion guidelines 

     ID checking process

     Continuation sheets

CRB and ACCESS NI are no longer accepting their 'old style' forms and any applications submitted using the old style forms will now be automatically rejected.