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Prisoners locked out – police custody

Prisoners locked out – police custody (Back to top)

Further guidance is provided within the national agreement on guideline framework between NPCC and HM Prison and Probation Service: charging for cell accommodation.

Police forces will be compensated for making cells available for the holding of prisoners. Compensation for this will be based on an actual cost model, made up of:

  • An initial 1-hour minimum charge, followed by hourly charging, calculated from officer/staff salaries, catering, cell blankets, towels and hygiene, heating/lighting/water/sewage and meals/drinks
  • Escorting of detainees, once in custody
  • Cost of doctor, interpreter, telephone and other direct costs

The charge is intended to cover the costs for all reasonably expected staffing levels (Custody Sergeant and Detention Officers only) and all ancillary costs including routine health care provision where this is accommodated via an ‘in situ’ service and no extra costs are incurred by the force. Lockouts can occur when: 

  • There is no accessible available space in prison for a newly remanded prisoner
  • Late sitting court resulting in the PECS supplier not achieving the latest prison reception time
  • PECS unavailable resource
  • Medical incidents requiring defendant to be escorted to hospital before a court outcome
  • Court cells capacity and/or HMCTS unable to hear resulting in no court outcome
  • Other: Vehicle failure/traffic
  • Unachievable PTRs: in the event that the Prisoner Transfer Request completed by the police is not achievable due to the time submitted then these instances are not able to be charged as a lockout as these fall within the responsibility of police

Police must ensure that all moves, irrespective if the prisoner was collected or not on the day, are recorded on BaSM. The invoice should: 

Any claim submitted outside of this period will be accompanied with an explanation as to the cause of the delay, an excessive delay may result in the late invoices not being paid.

Recalled prisoners locked out – police custody (Back to top)

It is critical that when a prisoner, who has the status of a prison recall, is placed onto BaSM for transfer to prison that the details are not amended.

If when contacting the local escort supplier vehicle base for confirmation of collection, the police station is informed that for any reason the prisoner cannot be collected, BaSM should not be amended, this includes the change of date/day.

For example, if a transfer request is raised onto BaSM on a Tuesday and the local escort supplier vehicle base explain that the prisoner cannot be collected until Wednesday, there is no need to amend the transfer request to Wednesday.

If the request is amended, it is highly likely this will change the audit trail of information and could/would affect the respective police force’s ability to reclaim incurred costs that they most likely should.

There are criteria which does distinguish whether a prison lockout is the responsibility of PECS to reimburse costs to the police and there maybe occasions where this criteria does preclude payment.

Verification of the information is clarified through the one single truth, that is the information held on the BaSM system. Please do not contribute to the possibility of confusing the truth and affecting the payment which should be made.

Operation Safeguard (Back to top)

Should Operation Safeguard be activated, the agreed protocol between police and HMPPS will be reviewed and circulated to operational leads within police forces.