National Database and Registration Authority (NADRA) has announced that applicants whose identity document applications are marked QC Rejected will have them resubmitted under the Executive category free of charge according to a post by NADRA on X. QC stands for quality control, a stage at which NADRA reviews an application before the identity document is issued, and an application that does not pass it receives the QC Rejected status. Applicants who see that status after applying at a NADRA Registration Centre or through the PakID mobile app should visit their nearest NADRA centre to complete the necessary formalities. Once the process is complete, NADRA will resubmit the application in the Executive category without an additional fee.
Overseas Pakistanis can follow a separate procedure. Applicants for the National Identity Card for Overseas Pakistanis (NICOP) or the Pakistan Origin Card (POC) who live in countries without a NADRA centre should submit a complaint through NADRA’s official complaint portal. After NADRA completes the required process, a new application appears in the Applications section of the applicant’s PakID account, and it receives free Executive-category processing. The facility is meant to help applicants resolve QC rejections and continue with their application without paying again, but the announcement does not say how long the resubmission takes or which reasons for rejection are covered.
The Executive category matters because it is the fastest and most expensive of NADRA’s processing tiers. Pakistan’s consulate in Birmingham lists Executive processing for a smart NICOP at £83.50 with a delivery time of 10 working days, compared with £55.50 and 31 working days for normal processing, though fees and timelines differ by country and may have changed. NADRA also gives priority to executive tokens over urgent and normal ones at its centres, according to the consulate’s FAQs. Moving a rejected application into that category without a fee therefore saves the applicant the extra charge that they might otherwise have paid to speed up a second attempt.
The procedure follows NADRA’s push to move applications to its PakID app, and the authority has repeatedly told the public to use only its official app and to avoid other websites or apps that claim to offer registration. QC rejections can occur for several reasons, such as problems with documents, photographs, biometric data, or information entered in the application, according to guides prepared for applicants, and the right fix depends on the reason shown. NADRA’s announcement does not give the numbers of applications affected, whether the offer has a deadline, or whether applicants who already paid for a second application can claim a refund, so people in that position should ask at a NADRA centre.
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