What Nacro is#
Nacro began in 1966, formed from the National Association of Discharged Prisoners' Aid Societies, and is now one of the largest charities working in criminal justice in England and Wales. It runs supported housing, education courses for young people, health and wellbeing services, and help for people leaving prison, including short-term accommodation for people released on licence or bailed with nowhere suitable to live. The Charity Commission register shows almost all of its income comes from government contracts. Its services in Wales run as Nacro Cymru.
Its Criminal Record Support Service#
The part of Nacro that bears on a change of name is its Criminal Record Support Service. It gives free information, advice and advocacy on criminal record questions to people with records, their families and professionals working with them. The contact page gives a helpline and an email address, open Monday to Thursday from 9am to 5pm and on Friday afternoons from 1pm. We found no web chat or online form for individuals.
Beyond answering questions, Nacro's advocacy page says it can act for you: helping you disclose a record, challenging the level of check an employer has asked for, disputing what the police have disclosed, or making representations when the barring service is minded to bar you. Employers have a separate advice service.
Where a deed poll comes in its advice#
Nacro's page on the right to be forgotten (last changed, by the page's own data, in December 2024) is about getting old news reports out of search results. Its order of steps is clear:
- Ask Google to remove the links under the right to be forgotten. Nacro says it knows of successful requests for spent convictions, and of none for unspent ones.
- Ask the website to take the story down or amend it.
- Only "if all else fails", consider a deed poll so that you cannot easily be linked to the story. The page links to GOV.UK's deed poll guide.
It adds a warning: if your convictions are unspent, or you are on licence or managed under MAPPA, a new name will not necessarily remove the need to disclose your record to an employer, and will not stop it appearing on criminal record checks. What it can do is stop a search by an employer, colleague or customer bringing up the old articles.
One practical detail is easy to miss. Google's removal form takes only one name, so someone known by two versions of their name can list just one of them. Nacro's page on becoming self-employed makes a related point: where an offence was widely reported, you might change your name, or trade under a different one, so that customers searching your business do not find it.
What the page does not cover#
Nacro's page does not mention telling the police. Its separate advice for people on the sex offender register says that if any registered detail changes, including your name, you must tell the police within three days. Under the Sexual Offences Act 2003 the clock starts on the first day you use the new name, and the same 3 days apply to registered violent and terrorist offenders. On licence, a standard condition asks you to tell your supervising officer about any different name. A DBS application asks for every name you have used, so a criminal record check finds the record under the old name as well.
Section 125 of the Crime and Policing Act 2026, which will let the police bar some registered sex offenders from applying for a passport or driving licence in a new name without permission, has passed but was not in force when we checked legislation.gov.uk on 26 October 2026.
Read more in the handbook#
- Can I change my name if I have a criminal record?: every police, licence, prison and DBS rule in one place.
- What DBS asks for: previous names on a check, and the route for transgender applicants.
- Who can see my former name?: why an unenrolled deed poll stays private and an enrolled one does not.
- Charities for people with a criminal record.
This page describes what Nacro publishes on its own website, read on 26 October 2026. Nacro has not reviewed it, and listing a charity here does not mean it recommends this handbook or any deed poll service.
