In the processing of applications (whether paper or online) it is necessary that agency workers manually check that applicants are not already registered within the system before they register the applicants as new persons within the system. Agency workers may search for and select a number of existing registered persons as probable matches for the applicants recorded on the application. This is to assist with the person clearance. The system creates this record for each possible person identified by the agency worker.

Example

An application is received by an agency. The application is recorded in the system, for each applicant the agency worker must check if the applicant is previously recorded in the system before creating them as a new person and associating them with the application. The application included an applicant called Linda Smith. The agency worker searches the system for registered persons of the name Smith. The search returns many Smiths, and in the list returned, there are 3 that the agency worker thinks could be the same person as the applicant, one named Sue Smith, one named Susan Smith, one named Susie Smith. The agency worker flags each of these registered persons as a possible match for the applicant Susan Smith. Further analysis is required before the agency worker can make the determination as to which of the selected possible persons is an exact match for the applicant.