Small,Business,Owner,Guide,Bac business, insurance Small Business Owner’s Guide to Background Checks

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Good employees are valuable.  For small companies, making bad hiring decisions can mean the difference between staying in business, or not.  The prevalence of background checks on prospective employees continues to grow every year, and employers need to clearly understand the privacy rights of their applicants.If you intend to run any credit reports on your prospective applicant, you need to be aware of the federal Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA), 15 USC § 1681 et seq., which is enforced by the Federal Trade Commission, as well as the California Investigative Consumer Reporting Agencies Act (ICRAA), Civil Code §1786 et seq.  These laws cover any written, oral, or other communication, which includes any report made about a person by a consumer reporting agency that bears on the person's credit standing, credit capacity, character, general reputation, personal characteristics, or mode of living.  This includes credit reports and investigative consumer reports such as interviews with neighbors, friends or associates made for the purposes of hiring, promotion, reassignment or retention.How much information and the exact content of a background check is best determined by the type of job the hire will be doing.  If you're hiring a VP of Finance, credit should be part of your check.  If someone is driving a truck for your business, you must run a driving record check.  In any case, but particularly when employees will deal with children, elderly or will be working inside someone's home, a criminal record check is critical.  The kind of information that can be accessed includes: credit history, criminal records, driving records, past employment verification, education verification, references, professional licenses, worker's comp claims, medical history, and drug and alcohol screening.Criminal records are held by each court system making them public records and available to anyone unless some restriction is imposed by a particular court.  What's crucial to note is that, in the state of California, arrest records cannot be reported at all unless a conviction resulted, and convictions can only be reported for the last 7 years.  Third-party providers who do background checks are also required to send the applicant a copy of the report provided to the hiring firm.It is possible to conduct your own criminal check, rather than hire an outside company, by requesting court records from each jurisdiction where the applicant may have lived.  This process, however, can take months to complete unless you are physically able to walk into the court where the records are located and pay the over-the-counter fee.  Keep in mind that some counties split felony and misdemeanor records.  And, there is always the issue of potential liability.Public records, other than criminal, include such information as bankruptcy, civil judgments or tax liens.  Civil judgments and tax liens cannot be reported after 7 years and bankruptcy has a 10-year restriction.   For more information on time limits and reporting public record information, see the following: www.ftc.gov/os/statutes/fcra/leblanc.htmwww.ftc.gov/os/statutes/fcra/slyter.htmwwwftc.gov/os/statutes/fcra/goeke.htm The FCRA imposes a number of other obligations on users (employers) of consumer reports which you can find herewww.ftc.gov/os/2004/11/041119factaapph.pdfReference checks can be a brief phone call to a former employer to verify facts such as dates of employment, salary and job title.   For more information on reference checks and when an inquiry becomes an investigative consumer report, see these FTC sites:www.ftc.gov/os/statutes/fcra/hinkle.htmwww.ftc.gov/os/statutes/fcra/beaudett.htm Screening applicants or current employees for use of drugs falls under state and federal employment and labor laws.  The US Dept of Labor's website provides a small business workplace kit that addresses this issue.  For more information, check herewww.dol.gov/asp/programs/drugs/workingpartners/Screen1.htm You should also visit the website for your state employment agency.  Check here for a 50 state directory www.dol.gov/esa/contacts/state_of.htm Why should you hire an employment screening firm?  First of all, any reputable screening company will guide you through the legal process including FCRA compliance involving getting an applicant's permission to run a check; as well as notices that you are required to provide in the event you decide to take an adverse action based on that report. Good screeners verify all data, including public record information, and assure that it is both accurate and complete before passing it along.  They also know how to determine if an applicant is who he/she says they are and what to do in the case of a common name records search.  In short, a good employment screening company can help protect your business from negligent hiring lawsuits, workplace violence, internal theft and fraud.  Now isn't that worth it?