Running electoral registration - England

Deciding whether to use local data for verification

The use of local data for verification matching is not compulsory. Your decision on whether to use local data matching should be taken after consideration of the benefits that local data matching can have in terms of reducing the burden on the applicant to provide evidence and follow-up costs. 

You should also consider the suitability of available data sets for this work and evaluate the potential costs and benefits of local data matching.

Before using local data to inform the determination of an application, you must ask the following questions:1  

• what sources of local data are available to me? 
• is the data record I intend to use accurate? 
• what benefit will I gain from using local data matching for a particular task? 
• what resources will I need to be able to use local data effectively? 
• what are the costs involved in developing/using local data matching capacity? 
• can I achieve beneficial results in sufficient time to meet the needs of the task? 

You may decide that the local data sets available cannot be used to verify the identity of the applicant or that directing the applicant to the exceptions process would be a more effective way of establishing identity.