Is this role in regulated activity?

England and Wales: This page sets out the test in full, as it stands after 1 September 2026. Scotland: this page is not about you — “regulated activity” does not exist in Scottish law; the concept is “regulated roles”, under a different statute, with no frequency test and no supervision exemption; see People — How do PVG and AccessNI checks differ from a DBS check? Northern Ireland: covered — Northern Ireland has its own Order with the same narrowed definition and lost its supervision exemption on the same day, but its own frequency figures were not read, so do not read England’s figures across.

Supervision stopped being a way out on 1 September 2026

Supervision no longer takes a role out of regulated activity. This step is for the safeguarding lead, trustees or manager deciding whether a role is in it.

It assumes the board has already established that safeguarding applies; this is the first of the checking steps. The decision settles which criminal record check the charity may ask for in England and Wales. Northern Ireland follows the same shape; Scotland uses a different concept.

England and Wales. Until the end of August 2026, one kind of volunteer was not in regulated activity. That was a volunteer who worked under reasonable day-to-day supervision by someone who was themselves in regulated activity.

That exemption has gone. Section 139 of the Crime and Policing Act 2026 removed it from the Safeguarding Vulnerable Groups Act 2006. It came into force on 1 September 2026.

Northern Ireland lost its own exemption the same day, under a separate section. The Northern Ireland section explains it.

The definition did not change a word. What changed is who falls inside it. A supervised volunteer doing a listed activity often enough is now in regulated activity, like anyone else doing the same work. Two things follow from that.

• The check. Some supervised volunteers could not lawfully be given a barred-list check before 1 September. Such a volunteer can be given one now, if the role meets the test. The next step covers which level of check you may ask for.
• The duty to refer. A charity whose people are in regulated activity is a regulated activity provider. That status carries a legal duty to refer certain cases to the DBS. A charity that relies on supervised volunteers may have picked up that duty on 1 September without doing anything. The reporting page covers it: make the reports, and know which are legal duties.

Any written determination that says “supervised, therefore not regulated” is now out of date. Re-do it.

One practical warning if you check the Act yourself. On legislation.gov.uk, the default “latest available” view of Schedule 4 may still show the old wording. That includes the supervision paragraphs and the supervision guidance duty in para. 5A.

The dated view of Schedule 4 at 1 September 2026, and the commencement note on s.139 itself, show the current law. Trust those.

Personal care and health care count even once

England and Wales. Two kinds of work are regulated activity with no frequency test at all. The first is relevant personal care. The second is health care given by or under the direction or supervision of a health care professional. Once is enough, and most guidance buries it. That is Schedule 4, para. 1(1A).

Para. 1(1D) extends the same rule to first aid given by someone acting for an organisation set up to provide first aid.

So do not apply the period condition below to a role that involves personal care. Such a role has nothing to count.

The test, in its parts

England and Wales. Regulated activity is the statutory category of work with children, or with adults, for which an enhanced check with barred lists is available. Work in that category also brings the duty to refer to the DBS. For other work with children, the definition has two independent limbs. A role that meets either one is in regulated activity.

• Limb one: the activity. An activity listed in Schedule 4, para. 2(1), carried out frequently by the same person, or meeting the period condition. This guide does not reproduce the list, because it was not read in full at source. Read para. 2(1) itself before you decide.
• Limb two: the place. Work in a specified establishment, such as a school or a children’s home, giving the chance of contact with children. The work is carried out frequently or meets the period condition.

The period condition has two routes. Either is enough.

• The number of days: More than three days in any period of 30 days.
• The overnight route: For activities within para. 2(1)(a), (b) or (c), the period condition is also satisfied if the person carries out the activity at any time between 2 a.m. and 6 a.m. and the activity gives the opportunity to have face-to-face contact with children.

Read the first one carefully. The words that matter are “more than”. Reaching the number of days exactly is not enough; the condition is met only when the number is exceeded. Guides that drop those two words move the trigger by a day.

“Frequently” is the other half, and the Act does not define it. The “once a week” rule you will see in many guides comes from guidance, not from the statute. This guide has not checked it against a primary source. Do not treat it as the legal test.

This page covers the definition for work with children. The definition for work with adults is separate, and was not read for this page.

What the answer decides

In England and Wales the answer decides two legal questions; it is not a risk rating.

• Which DBS check you may ask for. An enhanced check with barred lists is available only for regulated activity. Get the answer wrong and the charity asks for the wrong level, in either direction. See Which level of criminal record check can I legally ask for?
• Whether you carry the duty to refer to the DBS. Only a regulated activity provider does. Northern Ireland has its own version of both questions, set out in the Northern Ireland section.

Why this page will not give you a yes or no

The research behind this page did not read the full list of activities in para. 2(1). A decision tree built without it would give confident answers on the wrong basis. So this page sets out the parts of the test and the traps. It stops short of saying “your role is” or “your role is not”.

For a specific role in England and Wales, use the DBS’s own eligibility guidance on GOV.UK, and read Schedule 4 itself. This site’s tool is not ready: DBS level checker (planned).

Northern Ireland: the same shape, under a different law

Northern Ireland. Regulated activity in Northern Ireland is defined by the Safeguarding Vulnerable Groups (Northern Ireland) Order 2007, not by the 2006 Act. The 2012 reform that narrowed the definition in England and Wales applied to Northern Ireland too, directly, from 10 September 2012.

Northern Ireland also lost its supervision exemption on 1 September 2026. Section 140 of the Crime and Policing Act 2026 did it, brought into force by the Department of Health in Northern Ireland (S.R. 2026/153). The same trap applies to anyone checking the Order online: its Schedule 2 page may still show the old wording.

Three things differ in the detail.

• The frequency figures. The Order has its own period condition. Its figures were not read for this page, so do not assume they match England’s.
• The duty to refer. In Northern Ireland it sits in Articles 37 and 38 of the Order. Referrals go to the DBS, which holds the barred lists for Northern Ireland. Failing to refer is an offence under Article 40, with a fine capped at level 5.
• The barred-person offences. Article 11 makes it an offence for a barred individual to seek, offer or engage in regulated activity. Article 13 makes it an offence for a person to permit a barred individual to engage in it. That offence needs the person to know, or have reason to believe, that the individual is barred. Both carry imprisonment.

Scotland: a different concept

Scotland. There is no “regulated activity” in Scotland. The concept is “regulated roles”, under the Protection of Vulnerable Groups (Scotland) Act 2007 s.91. That section was substituted by the Disclosure (Scotland) Act 2020 from 1 April 2025. There is no frequency test and no supervision exemption.

Nothing on this page, and nothing in the DBS’s eligibility guidance, settles whether a Scottish role is covered. The Scottish checks page does: run the check in Scotland or Northern Ireland.

Common mistake (England and Wales): deciding regulated activity on how risky the role feels

The phrase sounds like a risk category. It is a statutory definition, with two independent limbs and a period condition. A wrong answer sends the charity to the wrong check level in either direction, and decides whether it carries the duty to refer.

Common mistake (England and Wales): applying a frequency test to personal care or health care

Most guidance buries the carve-out. Relevant personal care is regulated activity with no frequency or period test. So is health care under the direction or supervision of a health care professional (Schedule 4, para. 1(1A)). Para. 1(1D) extends this to first aid given for a first-aid organisation.

Common mistake (England and Wales): applying “once a week” as the statutory frequency test

It is widely repeated in guidance. “Frequently” is not defined in the Act. The statutory period condition is the one set out above. The “once a week” gloss comes from guidance and has not been checked against a primary source here.

Common mistake (England and Wales, and Northern Ireland): still treating a supervised volunteer as outside regulated activity

Until 31 August 2026 that was the law. It is not now. In England and Wales and in Northern Ireland, supervision stopped taking a role out of regulated activity on 1 September 2026. A determination that relied on supervision needs to be re-done. The charity may also have acquired a duty to refer that it did not have before.

Worked example

England and Wales. Tollgate Youth CIO runs a Friday-evening session. A volunteer helper works alongside the paid youth worker, who is in the room throughout. Last year Tollgate recorded the helper’s role as “supervised, therefore not in regulated activity”.

That reasoning stopped working on 1 September 2026. Tollgate now has to work through the test again, without supervision to lean on.

• Limb one. Tollgate asks whether the helper’s work is an activity listed in Schedule 4, para. 2(1). This page cannot answer that, because the list was not read in full. Tollgate reads the paragraph itself.
• Period condition. Tollgate counts the helper’s days on the rota against the period condition, over every window the condition covers, not just a typical month. It writes the count down.
• Personal care. The helper does not give personal care, so the no-frequency rule does not apply.

Tollgate records the answer for each limb, the date, and what it relied on. The record decides which check is lawful on the next step. It is not a risk rating.