If you have given a third invitation and no application to register has been made, you are required by law to make at least one visit to the address for the purpose of encouraging an application to be made.1
You can choose to make a visit at any time in the process, for example, at the same time as delivering any of the invitations. You may, therefore, have met this requirement before the end of the ITR chasing cycle. You must, however, have made a visit specifically for the purpose of encouraging an individual to make an application to register. In our view, this means a visit where you have attempted to make contact personally with the individual you are inviting.
What constitutes a personal visit?
A visit made only for the purpose of leaving an ITR and application form at the address with no attempt made to contact the individual being invited would not, in our view, satisfy the requirement.
The requirement would be fulfilled if the individual making the visit speaks to the individual being invited and encourages them to make an application.
As with all stages of this process, you should ensure that you keep records for the purpose of having a clear audit trail of the steps that you have taken as part of the ITR process. This will help to ensure that, if you consider requiring an individual to make an application, you are able to establish that the prerequisites for making such a requirement have been met.
You should, in any case, consider making a further visit if this is likely to result in an application being made.
If no application is made in response to the third invitation and you have made at least one visit to the address, you can move to the next stage of requiring the individual to make an application to register by giving them notice in writing of the requirement.2
A personal visit to a 14 or 15 year olds who have not responded to an ITR is not required at any time during the year.
If you do not make a visit to the household, you should consider what other mechanism you can use to encourage a response from those in this age group. For example, you could contact under 16s by email if you hold their email address.
Also, as part of any canvass follow-up activity, there may be an opportunity to remind any adults living at an address that 14 and 15 year olds are entitled to register and to ask them to encourage any 14/15 year olds at the address to apply to register online.
You should also work with partners that specifically work or have influence with young people and reflect this in your plans. We provide specific guidance on engaging with young people and attainers in our example tactics sheet for reaching target audiences below.