It would appear the the Criminal Record Bureau completely underestimated the volume of teachers that are being recruited for supply teaching these days

John Dunn, Select Education

The bureau - which finally began work on 11 March - had promised to respond to 90% of inquiries within three weeks.

But the agencies say the response time is more like six to eight weeks.

The Home Office, which has overall responsibility, says there have been teething problems with the bureau.

Part of the problem seems to be that it had underestimated the scale of the demand, caused by the shortage of full-time teachers.

The supply agencies are obliged to run checks on their staff to ensure they have no criminal records.

Demand

One of the biggest, Select Education, said it had put in requests for checks on about 1,800 names in the last month and only about 100 of them had been answered.

"It would appear the the Criminal Record Bureau completely underestimated the volume of teachers that are being recruited for supply teaching these days," said Select's John Dunn.

"We've got a situation where teachers can't start earning, we've got schools waiting for teachers, and of course it's damaging us commercially as well."

Apart from the sheer volume of requests, it is also thought the bureau had expected most requests to come by phone whereas they have been in writing.

A spokesman for the Home Office said that about half the forms that had been received had mistakes on them.

'Speeding up'

Because the demand had exceeded expectations, more forms had to be printed.

Now, 30 more staff have been taken on and training has been improved.

He said the system was speeding up and should be reaching its targets in another six to eight weeks.

The system discloses current and spent convictions, cautions, reprimands and warnings, as well as other relevant information held by local police forces.

It also checks lists held by the Department of Health and Department for Education of those considered unsuitable to work with children.

It was intended as a "one-stop shop" for England and Wales, replacing a system of local checks.

It is operated by Capita - the consultancy which also operated the Individual Learning Accounts system for the Department for Education, which collapsed amid widespread fraud by rogue training providers.