SC Clearance doom?

[WeThePeople]

Hi All,

This is the dreaded first post.

I work for a company, writing software, who is subbed out to a UK Government organisation down south. I have been working here for 2 years solid and am currently 21 years old, prior to this I held down a retail job for 2.5 years and before that a job which I left after 1.5 months - it sucked.

Anyways, the point is, we now require an SC clearance at work of which I am particularly distressed for several major reasons.

I have a ticket for theft AND previous caution against me - this occurred over 4 years ago, almost 5. It was bad, I was young and stupid, and very stupid. Staff theft, oh the shame, seriously it kills me thinking how much of a wretched fool I was to do this.

Wait, that's not all, the shame continuous...

I also have a family who have a particularly bad reputation with the revenue, namely, my father did a years time when I was around 7 years of age. And prior to that I have two uncles which were involved in major fraud.

That is it in terms of reasons why I will 99.9% fail. I generally like my job and am very good at it, personally I have no idea what I would be doing otherwise. Over the past 4 years since my incident, I've matured greatly as a person and have held down two jobs for a substantial period.

I would be amazed if I pass SC clearance, but I'm worried first of all about how this will affect my current employment? Could I be sacked? suspended?? I'm absolutely dreading it, so much so that I'm considering leaving work before I complete the SC forms.

Personally I've lost all hope. Although I genuinely believe i've grown up and know right from wrong, my past and my family have completely tainted my record however I have little hope that anything that's happened since will be the deciding factor in this.

My long term plan was to progress to a senior role and possibly go contracting however my entire life plan has crumbled over the past few days

Any ideas what I should do?

Resign? or anything else?

Thanks in advance - if you can help me, then anything is possible.

Ahh *sighs*

Regards

[cojak]

You will only fail if you lie, omit or attempt to deceive in order to get SC clearance. If you are as upfront with them as you are with us you will probably* pass.

*There's no guarantee that you will pass but it's more likely if you are honest about your past.

[WeThePeople]

@cojak, thanks for the quick reply

I plan on being completely honest in regards to everything, I'm mostly worried about what may happen to me if/when I fail.

Do all IT companies require SC clearance? or is it only for government roles?

What is the likelihood that I get a job elsewhere and they only require a basic check or CTC?

[Harmonic]

^^This.

When I was going through getting a very high level of clearance it was all about what could be used as a lever. They don't really care what you've done as long as you're open and upfront and no one could use it to blackmail/coerce you.

[SpontaneousOrder]

They're mostly interested in making sure you aren't in some compromised position such that you can be bribed / blackmailed etc. So wait and see what happens. You might be fine.

[CoolCat]

There are serving police officers with worse criminal and family histories than you have. So play it clean and honest and you should be ok.

[northernladuk]

Any reason you didn't read the SC clearance sticky at the top if this very sub forum? You'll see 100s of the same questions all with exactly the same answers and plenty of supporting discussion to help you. No point going over it all again.

[DaveB]

@cojak, thanks for the quick reply

I plan on being completely honest in regards to everything, I'm mostly worried about what may happen to me if/when I fail.

Do all IT companies require SC clearance? or is it only for government roles?

What is the likelihood that I get a job elsewhere and they only require a basic check or CTC?

The only places you will need security clearance are for roles where you will be working on government related projects, and even then only the ones that involve, or have the potential to involve, access to sensitive information.

Most companies, not just IT, don't require clearance to work for them, although they will generally do the usual CRB / Disclosure checks that any company will do.

Even if you don't get clearance, it's not the end of the world. There are far more jobs out there that don't need it than ones that do.

It's unlikely your current employer would try to get rid of youif you dont get it. They are more likely to shift you to another client where it's not needed.

[BlasterBates]

You're actually more likely to fail if you are squeaky clean but once had a Russian or Chinese girlfriend, or perhaps spent an innocent weekend in Pakistan.

I imagine quite a lot of convictions wouldn't have any bearing on SC (just a guess ), whereas an unpaid debt might finish you off.

So there's no point in feeling guilty or bad because even people with an unblemished record can fail.

Just fill the thing out and be totally honest.

[TheFaQQer]

Any ideas what I should do?

Resign? or anything else?

As others have said - be honest with the forms. People make mistakes - but if you try to hide it (and they already know), then you'll never get clearance.

Some places have a different level of clearance, even within SC - a friend of mine got clearance for the MoD but couldn't get it with a police force when he moved from the MoD.

Don't resign, though - if you do that you'll have nothing. Stick with it, and hope you pass the clearance.