Who is required to keep a liquor incident register?
A Liquor Incident Register is mandatory if you are the licensee of a premises that is:
- authorised to sell or supply liquor after midnight at least once a week on a regular basis
- located in the Kings Cross or Sydney CBD Entertainment precincts – except for packaged liquor licences or on-premises licences without a Primary Service Authorisation (PSA), and the class is not a theatre or cinema
- party to a liquor accord and required to keep an incident register under the terms of the accord
- required to have an incident register due to a specific licence condition.
Benefits of an incident register
Maintaining an incident register will give you a better understanding of incidents that affect the safety of your licensed premises and customers.
It will also help you to develop appropriate strategies to reduce the risk of alcohol-related violence and anti-social behaviour at your licensed premises.
An incident register provides the ability for a licensed premises to make detailed notes of incidents should the incident need to be reviewed at a later point in time.
We encourage all licensees to maintain an incident register even if it is not a requirement for your licensed premises. They are a useful compliance tool and can form part of your venue's responsible practice
Maintaining a register
It is important to put procedures in place to ensure your incident register is carefully maintained.
It is considered best practice for a licensee to review the incident register on a regular (daily) basis to ensure that they are aware of any issues that have occurred.
You may delegate this responsibility to managers or other key staff at your licensed premises. However, it is a legal obligation for the licensee or approved manager to maintain the incident register.
Information recorded in a mandatory incident register must be retained for at least three years.
Gambling incident register
As of July 2024, all licensed premises with one or more gaming machines will be required to keep a record of all gambling incidents in a Gambling Incident Register.
Licensed premises can choose to maintain their liquor and gambling incident registers together or in two separate incident registers. For ease of operations and reporting it is recommended to maintain the two registers separately unless you are using a digital incident register platform.
Incident register format
A licensed premises that is required to keep a mandatory incident register must do so in a form approved by the Secretary.
You can do this using a bound book available for purchase or a digital incident register or a digital incident register matching the digital requirements set out in the Digital Incident Register Guidelines.
If your licensed premises is not required to keep a mandatory liquor incident register and chooses to voluntarily, you can use the following:
- the incident register book available from L&GNSW
- any bound book with pre-numbered pages and the same incident report content areas as our incident register
- any digital register provided that the form and manner of reporting is consistent with the requirements published on the L&GNSW website and in the digital incident register guidelines.
Frequently asked questions (FAQs)
What type of incident should I record?
The types of incidents you must record in your register are outlined in section 56 of the Liquor Act 2007 and clause 42 of the Liquor Regulation 2018.
Any incident on a licensed premises that occurs between midnight and 5am that involves:
- violence or anti-social behaviour at your licensed premises
- violence or anti-social behaviour occurring in the immediate vicinity of your licensed premises and involve a person who has recently left or been refused entry to your premises
- someone being asked to leave under section 77 of the Liquor Act 2007
- a patron needing medical assistance
- the possession or use of suspected prohibited drugs or plants on the premises.
You must record the details of any action taken in response to an incident.
What other incidents should be reported?
It is considered best practice for a licensed premises to report other matters that will help you gain a more complete understanding of incidents that affect the safety of your licensed premises, this includes matters that affect your venue's operations.
This includes, but is not limited to, such things as:
- entry refusals including minors, suspected intoxication, insufficient identification
- requests for liquor self-exclusion
- reports on drink spiking
- compliance issues including missing RSA competency cards and disturbance complaints
- injury/first aid for customers
- public liability case.
What information should be recorded in an incident register?
The incident register should be filled out and include the following information as per example below. The required fields include but are not limited to:
- date and time
- location of incident
- incident type
- additional details when reporting on mandatory incident types
- incident details, actions taken and summary outcomes
- witness details
- persons of interest details
- if police were notified or attended the incident.
All required incidents must be entered as soon as practicable after the event and within 24 hours of the event occurring.
This should outline any reportable incident that involves violence, anti-social behaviour, when customers are asked to leave, or when an injury occurs that requires medical assistance.
When is the grace period for old incident registers?
A grace period was in place until 31 December 2024, during which licensed premises were permitted to use the old incident register and digital register formats, as well as the new format. This period provided time for industry and digital incident register providers to transition to the new register format.
From 1 January 2025 you must use the new version of the bound book (green book) and digital register.
Where can I purchase an incident register?
Incident registers can be ordered by visiting the NSW Government's online shop. Discounts are available for bulk orders of 20 or more.
Who can view an incident register?
Our compliance inspectors and police can review incident registers when they audit a licensed premises, take copies of any incident register, or remove any register from a licensed premises.
It is an offence to not produce the incident register upon request (as well as previous registers from the past 3 years).
Incident register examples
Some examples of both mandatory and voluntary incidents that could be reported including but not limited to:
- removal for intoxication
- insufficient ID
- assaults/fights
- malicious damage
- requests for self-exclusion
- complaints
- injuries/first aid
- reports of drink spiking
- compliance issues, for example, missing competency card, faulty gaming machine
- disturbance complaints
- refusal of entry.
It is considered best practice to avoid using acronyms without further description. Incidents must be recorded as soon as practicable, but within 24 hours after the incident. Remember to always record the details of any action taken in response to an incident.
Below is an example of a completed incident report. You can utilise the extra lines provided on the back of the page if needed.
The bottom section must be completed for all incidents and includes police notification section if applicable.
Is there a quick way to log refuse of entry?
You can find the refuse entry log at the rear of the incident book.
This allows you to record refusals without having to complete a full incident report for each one.
Related links
Contact us at Liquor & Gaming NSW
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