Guidance

Use our business services

Learn about the services we offer to businesses that enable you to check SIA licences, submit licence applications and pay the licence application fee.

Choose your business service

We offer four business services that you can use free of charge. They are:

  • Licence Status Checker
  • Licence Pay Only
  • Licence Assist – for SIA approved contractors only
  • Licence Management – for SIA approved contractors only

You must have a business account on our licensing system in order to use these services.

Registering for a business account (video)

Licence Status Checker

Use our Licence Status Checker service to check that the security operatives you deploy hold valid SIA licences.

You can create your own ‘watchlists’ of staff – for example, the people working at a specific site or event. Licence information is taken from our public register of licence holders and displayed in a list format.

Licence Pay Only

Use the Licence Pay Only service to pay the application fee for licence applicants.

Applicants must agree to this by linking their account with yours. They will need to fill in and submit the application form themselves.

Our Licence Pay Only service includes all of the functionality of our Licence Status Checker service.

Licence Assist

This service is only available to SIA approved contractors.

Use the Licence Assist service to:

  • submit and pay for licence applications on behalf of your staff
  • receive updates on the progress of any applications you submit

Applicants must agree to this by linking their account with yours.

Our Licence Assist service includes all of the functionality of our Licence Status Checker service.

Find out more: Licence Assist for Approved Contractors (PDF, 624 KB, 9 pages).

Licence Management

This service is only available to SIA approved contractors.

You must meet specific requirements in order to use this service. These are in addition to the requirements you need to meet in order to be an SIA approved contractor.

Use the Licence Management service to:

  • submit and pay for applications on behalf of your staff
  • receive updates on the progress of any applications you submit
  • carry out the identity checks that would normally be done at a post office
  • update licence holder details such as their name, address, telephone number
  • ask for a replacement licence if the licence holder loses the one they had, or it is stolen
  • receive updates on any changes to the licensable status of your staff (for example, if we suspend or revoke a licence)

Applicants and licence holders must agree to this by linking their account with yours.

Our Licence Management service includes all of the functionality of our Licence Status Checker service.

How to apply for our Licence Management service.

Choose your business account

You must have a business account on our licensing system in order to use any of our business services.

We offer three different types of business account. They are:

  1. Super user
  2. Operator
  3. Administrator

Which one you choose will depend on what you want to use the account for.

Your business must have at least one super user before it can use our business services.

Super user

As a super user you can:

  • invite other business users to link with your business
  • remove business users – for example, when they leave or move to an area of the business that does not involve SIA licensing
  • invite security operatives to link with your business
  • create, edit and delete watchlists
  • manage correspondence between your business and us

With our Licence Pay Only service you can also:

  • pay for applications on behalf of any operatives linked to your business

With our Licence Assist service you can also:

  • submit and pay for applications on behalf of any operatives linked to your business

With our Licence Management service you can also:

  • submit and pay for applications on behalf of any operatives linked to your business
  • update licence holder details such as their name, address, telephone number
  • ask for a replacement licence if the licence holder loses the one they had, or it is stolen

Operator

As an operator you can:

  • invite security operatives to link with your business
  • manage the details of the business online account, including payment details
  • create, edit and delete watchlists
  • manage correspondence between your business and us

With our Licence Pay Only service you can also:

  • pay for applications on behalf of any operatives linked to your business

With our Licence Assist service you can also:

  • submit and pay for applications on behalf of any operatives linked to your business

With our Licence Management service you can also:

  • submit and pay for applications on behalf of any operatives linked to your business
  • update licence holder details such as their name, address, telephone number
  • ask for a replacement licence if the licence holder loses the one they had, or it is stolen

Administrator

As an administrator you can:

  • invite other business users to link with your business
  • manage the details of the business online account, including payment details
  • create, edit and delete watchlists
  • manage correspondence between your business and us

Link online accounts

Three of our business services allow you to manage parts of the licence application process – for example, by filling in the application form on behalf of someone else. Our Licence Management service also allows you to make changes to the personal information we hold about a licence holder, such as their name or address.

The applicant or licence holder must consent to you acting on their behalf like this. They provide this consent by agreeing to link their SIA online account with yours.

During the linking process we will explain the permissions they will be granting to you if they accept the link. These permissions will vary depending on which business service you are using.

You will not be able to act on their behalf unless they agree to the link.

Linking requests automatically expire after 48 hours.

Any link you establish using our Licence Pay Only or Licence Assist services will automatically expire when we make our licensing decision (grant or refuse).

Any link you create using our Licence Management service will continue until you or the person you are linked with removes the link.

You can remove a link at any time from within your online account. The person you are linked with can do the same from their online account.

If you or they remove the link while their licence application is still in progress, we will cancel the application.

Published 12 October 2020
Last updated 5 January 2021 + show all updates
  1. Edited the 'Choose your business service' section to: add a link to our 'Registering for a business account' video; add a link to our 'Licence Assist for Approved Contractors' document; add a link to our 'How to apply for our Licence Management service' guidance.

  2. First published.