A Live Scan request form comes from the agency or organization requiring your background check, not from the fingerprinting location. An employer, licensing board, or volunteer organization will either hand you a pre-filled form or point you to one on their website, because the form has to carry codes specific to that agency for results to reach the right place. Once you have the correct version, filling it out is straightforward. Using the wrong form or leaving key fields blank is the fastest way to delay your results.
Where the Form Comes From
The requesting agency is almost always your source. When an employer or licensing board tells you to get fingerprinted, they should provide a Live Scan request form with their agency information already filled in. Some agencies hand you a physical copy. Others email a PDF or post one on their website with instructions to print it.
If you weren’t given a form, contact the requesting agency directly and ask for one. Don’t assume the Live Scan operator will have the right version for your situation. Operators see dozens of different agencies every week and can’t guess which codes belong on your form.
Many states also publish a blank version of the form on their department of justice website. That blank form is useful if you already know your agency’s routing codes and just need the template. Grabbing a generic form and guessing at the codes, though, is a recipe for rejection. When in doubt, go back to the agency that asked for the background check.
The ORI Code and Why It Matters
The pre-filled agency section at the top of the form does two jobs: it identifies who is requesting the check and tells the state where to send results. It includes the agency name, address, an Originating Agency Identifier (ORI) code assigned by the state’s department of justice, and a mail code that routes results to the correct office.
Without those codes, the fingerprinting location cannot submit your prints and the background check goes nowhere. The FBI’s own guidelines for fingerprint submissions require an ORI for every submission, and cards missing this field are rejected without processing.1Federal Bureau of Investigation. Guidelines for Preparation of Fingerprint Cards and Associated Criminal History Information
A typo in the ORI is the single most consequential error on the form, and it’s also the hardest to catch, because the codes are meaningless strings of characters to most applicants. Before your appointment, compare what’s on your form character by character against whatever the agency provided. If something looks off, call the agency and confirm before you sit down at the scanner.
What You Fill In Yourself
The applicant section is yours to complete. You’ll enter your full legal name, any aliases or former names, date of birth, sex, Social Security number, driver’s license number, physical descriptors (height, weight, eye color, hair color), and place of birth. Every field matters. The FBI requires at minimum your name, date of birth, sex, and fingerprint impressions for processing, and submissions missing any of these are returned unprocessed.1Federal Bureau of Investigation. Guidelines for Preparation of Fingerprint Cards and Associated Criminal History Information
Copy your name, date of birth, and Social Security number directly from your government-issued ID. Even a small discrepancy between your form and your identification can flag the submission. If your legal name has changed since your ID was issued, bring documentation of the name change to the appointment.
Use black ink and print clearly. This sounds basic, but smudged or illegible handwriting creates the same problem as smudged fingerprints: your submission gets bounced back and you start over. Fill in every required field. The instinct to skip an optional-looking box causes more delays than anything else. If a field exists on the form, there’s a processing reason for it.
Application Type and Service Level
The form asks why you’re being fingerprinted (employment, licensing, certification, or volunteer work) and whether the check should run at the state level, the federal FBI level, or both. For most professional licenses and sensitive employment positions, agencies require both. The requesting agency usually specifies this on the form, so you shouldn’t have to guess.
The “reason fingerprinted” field on federal submissions must include the applicable statute authorizing the check, and for non-federal applicants that statute must match the literal description of the position.1Federal Bureau of Investigation. Guidelines for Preparation of Fingerprint Cards and Associated Criminal History Information That’s the agency’s responsibility to get right, but if the field is blank on the form you were given, call and ask before your appointment rather than after.
Common Mistakes That Delay Results
Most Live Scan delays come from a small handful of avoidable errors on the form itself:
- A missing or mistyped ORI code, which sends results to the wrong place or nowhere at all.
- Name mismatches between the form and your government-issued ID.
- Blank fields the applicant assumed were optional.
- Illegible handwriting that the operator has to interpret when transcribing.
- Using a generic blank form when the requesting agency has its own pre-filled version with specific codes.
Double-check the agency section before your appointment. Once your prints are captured and transmitted under the wrong code, correcting the record is far more work than catching the error at the counter.
What to Bring to Your Appointment
You need two things: the completed Live Scan request form and a valid government-issued photo ID. A driver’s license, state ID card, passport, or military ID all work. The operator verifies your identity against the form before capturing your prints. If the name on your ID doesn’t match the name on the form, you may be turned away.
Many Live Scan locations accept walk-ins, but scheduling an appointment avoids a wait. Search your state’s department of justice website for a list of authorized Live Scan sites, or ask the requesting agency for a recommendation. Locations include law enforcement offices, private fingerprinting services, shipping stores, and some government buildings. Bring a payment method as well. Most operators collect fees at the time of service, and unless your employer or agency has agreed to cover them, you’ll pay a rolling fee to the operator plus separate state and (if applicable) FBI processing fees on top.
Once your prints are captured and transmitted, results go directly to the requesting agency, not to you. If you’re waiting on a job offer or license decision that depends on the check, follow up with that agency rather than the fingerprinting location. The operator’s role ended when your prints left the scanner.