Person—letters of given name, text XX

Guide for use:

In the two spaces the agency should record the 2nd and 3rd letters of the client’s given name.

For example: If the client’s given name is Elizabeth the reported value should be LI. If the client’s given name is Robert the reported value should be OB.

If the client’s given name includes non-alphabetic characters—for example hyphens (as in Jo-Anne) or apostrophes (as in D'Arcy), these non-alphabetic characters should be ignored when counting the position of each character.

Regardless of the length of a person’s given name, the reported value should always be two characters long. If the given name of the person is not long enough to supply the requested letters (i.e. a name of less than three letters) then agencies should substitute the number ‘2’ to reflect the missing letters. The placement of a number ‘2’ should always correspond to the same space that the missing letter would have within the 2-digit field. A number (rather than a letter) is used for such substitutions in order to clearly indicate that an appropriate corresponding letter from the person’s name is not available.

For example: If the person’s legal name was Jo then the value reported would be O2 because the 2 is substituting for the missing 3rd letter of the given name.

If the person’s given name is missing altogether the agency should record 99 for the two spaces associated with the given name. In some cultures it is traditional to state the family name first. To overcome discrepancies in recording/reporting that may arise as a result of this practice, agencies should always ask the person to specify their given name and their family name separately. These should then be recorded as first given name and family name as appropriate, regardless of the order in which they may be traditionally given.

The selected Letters of given name can be used in combination with Letters of family name, Date of birth and Sex to develop a statistical linkage key to facilitate the linkage of records for statistical purposes only. This key will also enable linkage to other related databases that either have the same linkage key or the fundamental information to form the same key. The linkage is to assist research and analysis of the data, not for tracking of individuals through the system for case management.

The provision of letters of a person’s name can be a sensitive issue because of privacy and confidentiality concerns. The use of this information will be in accordance with privacy principles.