Police Identity Parades

Earn money for appearing in a police identity parade in your local station during crime ID line up jobs

Some forces still do traditional line ups. This involves a group of individuals who look alike forming a line and being given a number. A witness will then pick out the person suspected of a crime. The witness is usually behind one way glass.





The other people in the police identity parades are sometimes officers, though some forces prefer their officers to assign their constables and other ranks to get on with other work, rather than spend an hour or two hanging around doing this. This is where you can benefit. Some stations and forces keep a bank of people they can call on to take part. It usually takes less than a few hours and you are normally paid £10 or £15 for the first hour and £5 thereafter. Rates of pay vary from force to force.



Salary Checker page - allows you to compare average salaries for any job or industry within any location in the UK:






There can be some waiting around whilst officers brief the witnesses. The advantages to you are that you are paid for this time and may have access to the station canteen where you may get something free to eat and drink.

Some forces may pay expenses such as loss of earnings or travelling expenses for those taking part in police ID parades.

If make up has to be applied to a volunteer then an extra payment is given.

Most forces now use Video Identification Parade Electronic Recording Bureau (Viper) software. However, they still need a database of photographs of various people to blend in with their suspect. At the time of writing they were offering £10 if you agreed that they could use your photo.

Police Line Up Jobs

You do not need any skills or qualifications to take part in police line up jobs. You will be matched according to your height, weight, eye, hair and skin colour, disabilities, scars, etc. This enables them to form one with similar looking people to ensure fairness to the criminal and to ensure that the witness has demonstrated that they can correctly identify the criminal.

You should register in person at the station, fill in the form, and request to stay on record as being willing to take part in future ones. You should be prepared to go the designated stations at short notice, so do give the officer as many telephone numbers as you can and a mobile telephone number.

The information you provide will be treated confidentially and is subject to Data Protection legislation.

Children should have permission from their parents and their school before taking part.




Follow us on Facebook and Twitter.




The Grampian skies are under attack from an enemy jet. It is spilling a strange yellow smoke. Minutes later, people start killing each other.
Former Royal Air Force Regiment Gunner Jason Harper witnesses this and then his wife, Pippa, telephones him, shouting that she needs him. They then get cut off. He sets straight out towards Aberdeen city, unprepared for the nightmare that unfolds during his journey. Everyone seems to want to kill him.
Along the way, he pairs up with fellow survivor Imogen. But she enjoys killing the living dead far too much. Will she kill Jason in her blood thirst? Or will she hinder his journey through this zombie filled dystopian landscape to find his pregnant wife?

The Fence is the first in this series of post-apocalyptic military survival thrillers from the torturous mind of horror and science fiction novel writer C.G. Buswell.

Download Now.

Buy the Paperback.

Identity Line Up

Not all stations do police identity line up parades because of modern technology and cost cutting. For example some now use video and computer technology. This means they can even use a laptop or tablet device in a witness's home with a virtual ID parade. This is known as virtual video identity parades (VIPER). However there are still some forces where you can get paid to take part in them so it is still worth registering your interest.

Payment is usually made afterwards and you may be asked to sign a disclaimer or confidentially form.

You should declare this payment as a source of income to the Tax Office on your annual self assessment form. People on benefits are sometimes permitted to earn a small payment each week whilst retaining their full benefit payments - it is worth asking at your social security office. You could earn this extra cash and help the local community.



Follow us on Twitter:

Follow @findextrawork






An army veteran moves his family into a village, but his nightmare neighbour starts a battle of wits with him. Who will win this One Last War?

Buy my latest novel on Kindle or Paperback.

ID Parade

So are there any disadvantages to taking part in an ID parade? There may be a real criminal in the room! So you may be in presence of a burglar, murderer, rapist, thief, mugger, etc. However your safety should be assured because some officers may also be there and there will be officers and detectives' co-ordinating things.

Taking part is interesting work and worth doing to help your local force. Without volunteer's officers find it difficult to complete them and have to waste valuable hours looking for people in the community, in pubs and while on the beat.

Other articles of interest in the findextrawork website include:

Report A Crime



If you like this page and would like to easily share it with your friends and family please use the social buttons below:

  Tweet 

If this has not answered your questions or you need some more advice then please e-mail me. I would also welcome any advice to increase the information to make it more useful to others. I would also appreciate it if you were to send our link to your friends, forums and social media.


Automatically add us to your favourites folder - Bookmark Us. We update weekly with new earning opportunities.