How Police Refer Clients to Providers

The following provides an overview of

  • How Police Officers refer clients onto you for all Significant Issues except DV
  • How Police Officers refer Domestic Violence clients onto you
  • How you find out about a referral and how you process it.

In most cases, the key to referrals is the client’s consent and suitability to being referred to a Service Provider.

Consent

A Police Referral can be completed for any adult with their consent. For a child under 16 years of age the consent must be obtained from a parent/guardian.

Sources of Police Referrals tend to be where QPS have been called out to attend incidents and they observe a need for a referral to be submitted. Clients can also have a referral submitted by phoning in or attending the front counter of Police Stations, or by contacting Policelink. When attending an incident, a Police Officer will offer suggestions of Service Provider assistance to help with the issue at hand and explain:

  • That there are Services Providers / organisations available that can help them.
  • The benefits of engaging with a Service Provider.
  • That the Service Provider agency will not be reporting back to police private details of any meeting / engagement, only that the agency will confirm if they have provided a service to clients via way of selecting a Service Provider Action in order to close off the referral.

If a person agrees to a police referral, then Police Officers seek their consent to pass their details onto a Service Provider.

Once consent is given the Police Officer can then provide their details to an external Service Provider via the Police Referrals System. Officers generate these referrals through their internal QPRIME Police System – entering client details, verifying information is correct and then completing the referral information. The referral is then routed to an appropriate Service Provider whereby they make 3 attempts at contact over 2 business days before closing off the referral.

When referred a client will receive an SMS (where safe to do so) to advise who will be contacting them within the next 2 business days. The referring officer will also receive an email to advise them the referral has been successfully generated.

Officers work hard – and often over a period of time – to build rapport and trust with at risk and vulnerable people so that they are more open to and likely to accept a Police Referral to a Support Provider. Ongoing community Policing such as this serves many purposes and aims to reduce victimisation and recidivism.

Suitability Assessment

Genuine referrals have the potential to change the lives of vulnerable people. In many cases the person is not aware of the range of support services available.  Likewise, the Support Provider Service is often unaware of those who would benefit from their support.

Sometimes vulnerable people may not be ready to acknowledge they have a problem or be willing to accept an offer of assistance. This does not compromise the value of the referral process, however, indicates they may need to be offered a referral on multiple occasions before they are ready to accept the help.

Police Officers follow a Police Referral Suitability Assessment guide to judge the suitability of making a referral. This takes into account:

  1. Preparedness to access service: How willing is the referred individual to accept the telephone call, or other contact methods, of the Service Provider?
  2. Perceived Vulnerability: Are they vulnerable to victimisation, repeat victimisation or harm? Some indicators may be:
    1. History of repeat victimisation or similar incidents of like nature, i.e. Have they been victimised previously?
    2. Observations: How do they appear to be coping?
    3. Do they lack a supportive environment (e.g. family, friends)?
    4. Are they fearful or concerned this might happen again or be a recurring problem?
  3. Likelihood of recidivism: Have they currently, or previously, committed an offence?
  4. Likelihood of repeat police attendance: Is a referral likely to reduce the need for a further police response?
  5. Risk to community: Will the intervention provide a benefit or risk reduction to those in their immediate environment, e.g. family, peers, neighbours, social network?
  6. QPS Risk Profile: Will completing a Police Referral help to manage or transfer risk?

With Domestic Violence the referral process for clients can be different to the above as no consent is required.

As a result of the introduction of Section 169F of the Domestic and Family Violence Act, from 28th May 2017 Police Officers are able to give referral information to a specialist DFV Service Provider without that person’s consent. However, this can only be done if the Police Officer reasonably believes that the person:

  1. Fears or is experiencing domestic violence and there is a threat to the person’s life, health or safety because of domestic violence; or
  2. The person has committed domestic violence against another person.

If a Police Officer believes that the above conditions apply, they can make a Domestic and Family Violence (Aggrieved) and a Domestic and Family Violence (Respondent) referral even if the referred person has refused to give consent to the referral being completed.

Police prefer to have the consent of the person being referred but accept that in this situation it is not always possible.

As a Service Provider receiving this referral you will clearly know a) whether the person being referred is

  1. i) a victim (DFV Aggrieved), or
  2. ii) a perpetrator (DFV Respondent)

and whether consent was given. Police have 4 options to select when entering the Referral submission into the system:

  1. “Offer accepted”.
  2. “Offer declined”.
  3. Offer Declined – Information Provided
  4. Referred with Police Authority

The police can also record information in a remarks field before submitting.

Once a client is referred to you, you will receive an email notification to let you know that a referral has been received by your service.

The information you receive will be in a referral form and include:

  • Date of Referral
  • Referring Officer Rego and their Org Unit/Policing Unit
  • Clients Name
  • Date of Birth
  • Gender
  • Address
  • Contact phone number and email if they have one. Safe to contact methods addressed and listed.
  • Significant Issue
  • Sub category Issues (Can be more than one. This will also show if in the case of Domestic Violence whether consent was given or QPS Authorised for the aggrieved and or respondent)
  • Occurrence Summary Field (any comments / background notes the Police Officer has included)

You will have the opportunity to action the referral accordingly through your secure log on details and to close the referral after making 3 attempts at contact over 2 business days with a Service Provider Action. Once the referral is closed an email will be sent to the referring officer with the Service Provider Action selected.

Once you close the referral and where the action selected is ‘Client Contacted – Services Accepted’ or ‘ On-referred’ and where appropriate we ask you complete the outcomes component. By doing this you are providing some statistical information on the outcomes achieved and giving Police visibility over the Police Referral Process.