Release 5 release notes

Page contents:

Release 5 (R5) enables SMS suppliers to continue developing integration with STARS. You will be able to build and test against the full set of VET Information Standard (VET IS) business rules, use updated data mappings and work with more mature APIs.

A hot fix release implemented July 30, 2026 addressed numerous known issues (see known issues table at end).

Key capabilities available in this release include:

• Reference data API

• Updated Submission workflows and Validation workflows

• Complete VET IS business rule coverage

• Declaration API workflow changes

• Error responses via Problem Details

Key developer portal supporting material:

• STARS rules Catalogue

• AVETMISS to VET IS mapping

• Reference data to CSV script

Content and API changes

Business rules

All VET Information Standard business rules have now been implemented. The STARS API rules catalogue has been updated and expanded to reflect the validation rules and behaviour applied by the STARS APIs.

Updates include:

• current implementation statuses

• expanded implementation guidance

• implemented and planned validation phases

• structural rules not fully described in the OpenAPI Specification

You can use the catalogue to identify the rules you need to support. You can align your system’s validation behaviour with STARS, trace API validation failures to the relevant rule and implementation guidance and understand when each rule runs and against which data.

AVETMISS to VET IS mapping

The AVETMISS to VET IS mapping is now available on the VET Information Standard website.

You can use the mapping to:

• identify where existing AVETMISS fields and classification values are represented in the VET IS and STARS APIs.

• assess changes required to your data model by understanding where existing AVETMISS data can be reused or where it must be transformed, reclassified, split or combined.

• reduce the risk of inconsistent interpretation during implementation (and any potential rework).

Registered training organisation program and subject scopes to support testing

A specific, limited set of programs and subjects have been configured within the Client Integration environment to support development and testing activities.

Failure to use the configured programs and subjects will result in validation failures for rules dependent on the National Training Register training organisation scoped programs and subjects – specifically BRTS03190, BRTS07080, BRTS04100 and BRTS08340.

Use the programs and subjects documented on the developer portal for development and testing.

Minimal unit record (MUR) golden payloads

The Subject Enrolment and Program Enrolment Minimal unit record golden payloads have been updated for use with the synthetic RTO reference data. Only the programOrSubjectReferenceNumber values for the Program and Subject and nominalHours for the Subject resource have changed, all other payload data remains unchanged.

Reference data APIs

Reference Data APIs and guidance are now available to support retrieval and consumption of STARS reference data.

These APIs enable you to:

• retrieve current reference data directly from STARS

• incorporate reference data into application workflows and validation processes

• maintain alignment with current STARS reference values

A sample extraction script is now available to demonstrate how all reference data (excluding classification data) can be retrieved from the APIs and converted into CSV format for local consumption and analysis. All previous reference data CSVs have been removed.

Declaration updates

The Declaration APIs and associated documentation have been updated.

Changes include:

• removal of the dateOfDeclaration attribute from the POST Declaration request payload – this is a breaking change.

• inclusion of declarationDueDate in Declaration responses.

DateOfDeclaration should no longer be included when submitting declarations. The date of declaration is calculated based on the time the POST declaration API was called. The calculated declaration date is returned in the response for the POST and should be stored instead of passed in.

Error and validation framework

New guidance and scenarios have been developed, covering problem details responses, validation results, validation grouping, access paths, and pagination.

The validation result and problem details API contracts were established in Release 4. There are no contract changes in Release 5. The release introduces the following changes to system behaviour.

Failed validation results

Release 5 introduces the business rules that populate and exercise the fields, enabling meaningful validation responses across a range of client implementation scenarios. Client systems can now upload test data and observe real-world validation outcomes. This release provides STARS clients with the foundation needed to build, test, and verify their error-handling and validation logic against realistic validation responses and scenarios. Refer the STARS API rules catalogue for the details.

Problem details responses

All problem error responses follow the RFC 9457 problem details standard. Problem types are consistently categorised across bad-request, validation, not-found, conflict, content-too-large, and unauthorised scenarios. Each response includes a technicalRuleId identifying the specific rule that triggered the error, enabling client systems to detect and handle failures precisely. "technicalRuleId" values have been renumbered in Release 5 (from BRTS09xxx to BRTS90xxx). Refer the STARS API rules catalogue for the details.

Automated submission

Guidance for SMS suppliers who are implementing automated submission workflows with STARS has been updated. We previously advised automated submission workflows were not allowed by policy. SMS suppliers will need to review their designs in line with the updated guidance.

This guidance has been provided to assist SMS suppliers to understand that responsibility for the accuracy, completeness and compliance of submitted data remains with the RTO.

Release roadmap

Roadmap information outlining planned capability delivery has been updated.