IC Codes

• Say the code, then the sex, then the rest of the description: "IC3 male, approximately 25, around six foot, slim build, black puffer jacket, grey tracksuit bottoms, heading towards the car park." Our person description builder puts it in that order for you.
• It is your visual assessment. An IC code records how the person appears to you. It is not a nationality and you do not ask the person; if you cannot tell, use IC0 and describe what you can see.
• Keep it factual and respectful in statements and incident reports: "a male of IC4 appearance", never slang or guesses about where someone is from.
• Nationalities are not codes. English, Welsh, Afghan, Iraqi, Jordanian, Jamaican: none of these is an IC code, and a British citizen can be any code. The search above maps a nationality to the code people of that background most often appear as, so you can find it quickly, but on the radio you give the code for what you see.
• Pair it with the rest of the description. On its own an IC code identifies nobody. Age, height, build, hair, clothing, direction of travel and anything distinctive are what let a colleague or the police find the person.

The police also record self-defined ethnicity using the "16+1" classification (codes such as W1, A1, B2, M1), which is what a person says about themselves, for example on a stop-and-search form. IC codes are the officer's or operative's own observation. In security work you will almost always use IC codes, because you are describing someone you can see but have not spoken to.