Blue Card (QLD)
CodesAPI credentialType WWCC_QLDSpreadsheet import wwcc with State QLDAll credential codes
Queensland's Working With Children Check is the Blue Card, administered by Blue Card Services. Oho confirms it in real time against the Blue Card Services public validation page.
Queensland has one behaviour that catches people out, and it's worth knowing before you import a workforce: renewals don't flow through on their own. More on that below.
Who needs it
Anyone engaged in child-related work in Queensland. A paid Blue Card is typically valid for around three years; a volunteer card for around two.
What Oho needs
Three things, and Blue Card Services checks all three together: the card number with its issue number, the holder's full name, and the card's expiry date.
1234567/1 — the card number, a forward slash, then the issue number. Both parts are digits.
Spaces are ignored, so 1234567 / 1 is fine. The slash isn't optional: without it Oho can't tell the card number from the issue number, and the check is rejected before it reaches the register.
The issue number is the part people miss. It increments each time the card is reissued, so 1234567/1 and 1234567/2 are the same person's card at different points in its life — and only the current one validates.
Queensland needs the holder's full name, not just a surname. It doesn't need a date of birth.
Unusually, Blue Card Services matches on the expiry date as part of the check — a Blue Card with no expiry date on record can't be verified at all. Elsewhere in Oho the expiry date is a recommended field; for Queensland, treat it as required. See Spreadsheet columns.
Before you start
Nothing, for verification — Blue Card Services publishes a public validation page, so there's no login to provide.
Employer linkage is a separate matter. Queensland does support linking your organisation to a worker, and it needs a Blue Card Services portal account — Oho doesn't establish it as a side-effect of verifying. Oho can run the linking for you once that account is set up on the verification source: see Link your QLD Blue Card holders. Linking searches on different details from verification — the card number, surname and date of birth on the credential — so a card can verify as Valid and still not link when the date of birth on the credential is wrong. See When a holder shows Not found.
How Oho verifies it
Oho submits the card number, name and expiry date to the Blue Card Services validation page and reads the answer back, in real time — well under a minute.
If the first attempt comes back as no match, Oho retries with variations on the holder's name before giving up: the full recorded name, then combinations using the worker's alternate or preferred name. That's how a card held under a maiden name is still found without anyone intervening. The name that matched is recorded on the check.
Reading the result
Every check resolves to one of these outcomes:
| Status (as shown in the app) | Colour | What it means | API value (eligibility) |
|---|---|---|---|
| May engage | Green | Valid and current — the person is cleared for the work. | MAY_ENGAGE |
| May not engage | Red | Not valid — expired, suspended, not found, or a match on a ban register. | MAY_NOT_ENGAGE |
| Under review | Yellow | No decision yet — someone has to read the result and record one. Not a softer kind of pass: the worker counts as non-compliant until they do. | REVIEW_REQUIRED |
| In progress | Blue | Still being checked. | IN_PROGRESS |
| Couldn't verify | Grey | The source couldn't be reached; Oho will try again. | ERROR |
Validity and expiry are tracked separately from that verdict, and the badge always shows the most serious state on record — so these appear instead of one of the five above:
| Status (as shown in the app) | Colour | What it means | API value (statusDetail) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Expiring soon | Yellow | Still valid, but inside your expiry lead time — 30 days by default. Time to get the renewal moving. | EXPIRING_SOON |
| Expired | Red | The expiry date has passed, so the worker is no longer covered. | EXPIRED |
| Conditions to review | Yellow | The register attached a condition or a notation that someone has to read and decide on. | CONDITIONS_TO_REVIEW |
| Pending decision | Blue | The issuing authority has yet to decide on an application. | PENDING_DECISION |
A problem the register reports outright — the clearance revoked, no matching record, a newer card superseding this one — shows under its own name in red or grey, alongside the same statusDetail value. Every one of them is listed in what a check result means.
| What the register says | What Oho shows | Why |
|---|---|---|
1234567/1 is a valid card. | May engage | Current card, details match |
The card details provided cannot be validated. | May not engage | One of the three inputs doesn't match the register |
You must enter a valid card number, as it appears on the card. | May not engage | The number wasn't in cardNumber/issueNumber shape |
You must select a valid expiry date, as it appears on the card. | May not engage | The expiry date was missing or wrong |
The register confirms a card is valid but doesn't tell Oho when it runs out — it only reports the time the answer was current as at. Expiry tracking therefore uses the date you supplied, which is the other reason that field matters here.
When it doesn't verify
| What you see | What it means | What to do |
|---|---|---|
| May not engage — invalid card number | The number isn't in cardNumber/issueNumber shape | Add the slash and the issue number. 1234567 alone won't do |
| May not engage — invalid expiry date | No expiry date on record, or it doesn't match the card | Add the expiry date exactly as printed on the card |
| May not engage — can't be validated | Card number, issue number, name or expiry doesn't match. Usually the issue number | Check the issue number against the physical card — a renewal will have incremented it |
| Was green, now red, and the worker says they renewed | Exactly the Queensland renewal behaviour — the new issue number isn't on record | Update the card number and expiry from the new card. See below |
| Couldn't verify — provider error | Blue Card Services returned a malformed answer | Nothing. Oho retries on the next run |
Renewals & monitoring
Renewals do not flow through automatically in Queensland. This is the single most important thing to know about this credential.
When a Blue Card is renewed, Blue Card Services issues a new issue number. Oho has no way to guess it, so the card on file keeps being checked with the old number — and starts coming back as not validated. Nothing is broken; the record is simply stale.
So a Queensland renewal is a data task, not just a compliance one:
- Get the new card number and expiry date from the worker.
- Update the credential on their profile, or re-import the row.
- The next check picks it up.
Between renewals, monitoring works normally: Oho re-checks on your schedule and a suspension or cancellation shows up without anyone asking. It's specifically the renewal transition that needs a person.
Queensland also recognises certain exemptions in place of a Blue Card — a registered teacher, for example. Those are recorded as an exemption rather than as a Blue Card.