Open Case Add Australian callsign to database - recent changes to licensing for Hams in Australia

Hi,

Geoff here.

I've just finalised the allocation of my callsign, VK5GDR with the ACMA, who have again taken over Amateur Licensing from Australian Maritime College in Tasmania who've been doing it for some years.

This was part of a recent radical change to the Amateur Licensing process here and as a consequence, Hams of all classes DO NOT have individual licenses anymore.

The Amateur Apparatus License has been replaced by a free Class License, as CB was some decades ago.
This means that Hams no longer have to pay annual license fees for their Ham license.

Details are here https://www.acma.gov.au/amateur-radio

There is no change to the qualifications. You must have the appropriate qualifications for your level of license (Advanced Class in my case) recorded with the ACMA, and you must have a callsign issued by ACMA. I've applied for my (long ago expired) Callsign and got acknowledgement yesterday and the bill for the Callsign Issue which I have paid, and it now shows in the ACMA Callsign Database.

As I understand it, I will get an official certificate of callsign registration in ten days or so.
My requested callsign (which was my previous callsign last time I had a current license) is in the database and is shown as 'Assigned to Advanced'. So, it's been done. Just have to wait for the certificate to arrive.

In the interests of privacy for hams, that is ALL the information that is supplied to the publicly applicable Register of Callsigns, and as there are no new individual licenses being issued, hams that currently have an unexpired Amateur Apparatus at the time of the change (19th February) will automatically be transferred to the new system as their licenses expire or they cancel them and ask for a refund of whatever is left of the fee.

This means that no new amateurs will have any details of their name, address and location published in a publicly accessible database after 19th February, and those with a current Apparatus license will disappear from the Register of Radio Communication Licenses as their license expires or is cancelled (they no longer need it).

So, within a year, there will be no individual ham licenses registered in the Register of Radio Communication Licenses as existing licenses expire, as all hams are now part of the Class License system.

The Register of Amateur Callsigns is publicly accessible and lists all Ham callsigns, sorted by reserved (special purpose etc.), available for issue, assigned, and to what license class.

You can access it here: https://www.acma.gov.au/call-signs

The callsign and the license class it is issued to is ALL that will be displayed in that database.

So, basically, there is no way anyone online can verify if a particular callsign is assigned to a particular person from that database, only that the callsign is allocated to an individual or club (it won't say which) and the class of license. The callsign itself indicates a state (VK5 or VJ5 indicate resident in South Australia) however I'm informed that even if I were to move interstate, that would not change unless requested, so even that is not guaranteed now the new system is in operation, as my equivalent callsign in, say Victoria (VK3), might be already allocated (presently it isn't but you see how it works...)

Obviously, most hams are happy with this as it means we no longer have to pay annual license fees, just a one off fee for a callsign allocation or later change. Allocations are permanent. It seems every 5 years they'll ask if you still want it, but otherwise are for life and there are no ongoing fees, only the $41.25AU for initial callsign allocation. We retain the option to use the special occasions prefix AX for certain days, (Australia Day etc) but that prefix is not permanently issued to anyone.

So. How to verify that someone is a licensed amateur given there is no individual license issued?

I suspect the only way will be to send you a copy of the Callsign Registration Certificate. Not sure in what form it comes, but likely a PDF document. I'll post mine so you can see the format, with my info redacted.
As far as I can tell, there is no online database that is publicly accessible that will give individual details beyond that the callsign is allocated and to what class of license, and the state of residence of the amateur, which for now, is obvious from the callsign itself.

All that said, I obviously would like my callsign registered in your database, so I will provide an unredacted copy of my Callsign Allocation Certificate as soon as it arrives for that purpose. I have been a registered member for some years, dating back to when I was previously licensed, fortunately my (then) callsign has remained unallocated for the most of 8 years I was unlicensed and it has been reallocated back to me, so I didn't need the alternate callsign I nominated if that turned out to be unavailable.

Hope this is useful information.

Please get in touch in regards to getting my CS on the database.

Regards,
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