Recommendation - Avon and Somerset Police and Wiltshire Police, April 2026

The IOPC recommends that Wiltshire Police and Avon & Somerset Police create and maintain an up-to-date list of STORM Codes and Transfer Codes on their STORM systems to allow the effective use and transfer of incidents between the two forces.   

This follows an independent investigation into Wiltshire Police and Avon & Somerset Police’s handling and response to the report of a missing child (Child A) who eventually came to serious harm. The initial report was reviewed and assessed by Wiltshire Police and the incident log was forwarded to Avon and Somerset Police via the STORM system as it was believed that Child A had gone missing from their force area.   

The investigation found that when a force sends an incident log to another police force, the STORM System uses a table which translates the other force’s incident code into those used by the receiving force. However, as Avon & Somerset did not have a translation in the table for ‘MISPER’ (abbreviation for missing person) as used by Wiltshire Police, the STORM System only copied what had been entered in the original incident record. This resulted in the STORM System failing to recognise that the incident related to a missing person and the incident log was therefore not brought to the attention of a control room supervisor in Avon & Somerset Police.  

The investigation also found that several codes used by Wiltshire Police and Avon & Somerset Police had either been replaced with different codes or the previous codes were no longer in use, but this information had not been updated or shared with the relevant forces. 

This resulted in a failure of vital information regarding Child A which had been collated by Wiltshire Police from being copied across on the incident log when it was shared with Avon & Somerset Police. The failure by both police forces to have an updated table of relevant codes for use in the STORM System contributed to a failure of the STORM System to identify the incident as a missing person but also resulted in the failure to transfer vital information which may have assisted in locating Child A sooner.

Accepted

We have subsequently established STORM Service Code translation tables for logs received from Wiltshire, Devon & Cornwall, Dorset, and Gloucestershire. Those forces have also been given our codes.  We have also added an annual task for our STORM admin team to email the Buddy Forces to check for any changes to the Service codes. 

We consider this to be appropriate action taken to meet the requirements of the recommendation.