A Public Services Card cannot be issued to a person unless they first complete a SAFE registration process.
My Department operates a number of methods to SAFE register a person. The usual method involves a combination of all of the following including:
- A face-to-face meeting at an Intreo Centre or a dedicated SAFE registration centre;
- The collection and verification of the basic identity information known as the person’s Public Service Identity (PSI) data set;
- The examination/validation/verification of at least two documents supporting identity; and
- Photo-matching.
As part of the verification process, the person’s photo is run through software to check against other photos that have already been taken during other SAFE registrations. This is to detect and/or prevent duplicate registrations.
My Department can also provide a mobile registration service to cater for people who have difficulty attending an Intreo Centre or a SAFE registration centre
In some cases, where a customer authenticates their identity in another face-to-face engagement, the Department may collect elements of the PSI data by post and, with the consent of the customer, will utilise existing photographs to complete the SAFE2 process. This eliminates the need to attend at an Intreo Centre or a dedicated SAFE registration centre specifically for the purpose of registering to SAFE2.
Over 2.65 million people are SAFE-registered to date, of whom 493,466 were registered by post. A breakdown of these cases by year is as follows:
Year
Total
2012 5,325
2013 87,435
2014 156,493
2015 61,156
2016 142,123
2017 24,461
2018 16,473
Total
493,466
I trust this clarifies the matter for the Deputy.