Background Screening Explained
Background screening is notorious for being more complicated than employers expect. If you want simple and fast, we hear you. But you may end up wasting your time and money. Worse yet, you could end up with a lawsuit on your hands, a criminal in your midst, or worse. Fortunately, our company, Health Street, devised simple packages and online ordering for our employee background check services that makes it both simple for the employer and offers the best possible protection from criminals, offenders, and potential lawsuits. Health Street's proprietary "Court Record Package" is our 3-step method that ensures the best protection for your company while ensuring the fastest response time for a reasonable price. We also offer database add-ons to this package which offer extended protection.
Are you a job candidate who has received a request for a pre-employment background check? You may be uncertain about your rights as an individual when it comes to a company's pre-employment background checks. Know this—with our screening services, Health Street complies with all state and federal laws, and this includes your rights as a candidate for a company position.
Keep reading to learn more about background screenings, and what you need to know as either a hiring manager or a future employee.
What Does a Background Check Consist of?
This screening investigates a job candidate's background. The criteria can be narrow or broad, chosen by their current or prospective employer. Background screening services can include the person's prior employment and reference checks, education verification, criminal history, motor vehicle record and driver's license, certifications, and credit history.
What Details Are Included in Background Screenings?
It may show prior criminal activity and driving infractions. It may include previous employers, with employment dates, titles, and job duties. It will often include educational institutions, degrees, and licenses pertaining to their industry. It may include their credit report and social media accounts.
Do Criminal Records Show in Background Checks?
Criminal background checks show misdemeanor and felony criminal convictions, pending criminal cases, and the person's incarceration history. A prosecution with a pending arrest might be reported. Arrests that didn't lead to convictions may be included, though background check companies may exclude these to comply with EEOC guidelines.
Employment Background Check Services – FAQs
You may have questions about what is allowed by law as part of a screening. An employer has a legal right to request a background check from a prospective employee, to ensure that the individual is qualified for the job and that they don't pose a risk to co-workers, customers, clients, or patients. An individual also has rights, such as having to allow, in writing, this screening to take place.
For Employers
What laws must I comply with when running a background check? There are state and federal laws and guidelines that dictate who can request a screening, what they can ask, and how they must go about it. These include the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA), the seven-year reporting window for criminal offenses, guidance on considering arrest and conviction records to comply with Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, and other screening policies.
Can a background check find jobs that the candidate didn't list on their resume? Background reports can't produce a complete list of all jobs that the person had in their lifetime. They can only verify those that they list on their resume as part of their work history.
What should I look for in background check results? Compare the background check results with what the person wrote in their application and resume, and what they may have shared with you during an initial interview. Do the dates and previous employers match up? Is there any "missing time" that is unaccounted for? Does their education history, including degrees and professional certifications, align? What did references say about them? For trucking and transportation jobs, look carefully at driving records for any infractions.
For Candidates and New Hires
Can a company run a background check on me without my permission? No. You must give a potential employer written permission to run a background check on you, and you can refuse. However, if you do refuse, they have the right to reject your application. If a company does run a background check on you that you haven't agreed to, you should contact the Federal Trade Commission (FTC).
What can disqualify me on a background check? You may be turned down for a job if the report shows that you have a poor work history, received a bad reference from a prior employer, have a criminal record, have a poor credit history (for certain financial jobs), have a poor driving record, or failed a drug or alcohol test.
Will a background check turn up a misdemeanor offense I committed when I was a kid? Crimes you committed before the age of 18 are treated differently state by state. In most states, teenage convictions will probably not appear. If you're uncertain, check with your state's laws.
Can I be asked about my family's medical history? According to the EEOC (U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission), an employer may not ask you for medical information until they have offered you a job. They aren't allowed to ask for genetic information at all, including your family's medical history, except in rare circumstances.
The FTC provides job seekers with additional guidance about background checks and your rights. Laws regarding past criminal convictions, for example, vary by state.
How Do Health Street Employment Background Check Services Work?
Our background check process begins with you authorizing us to run background checks on your company's behalf. To do this, you fill out and electronically sign a simple online form. Then, we email your employees an electronic waiting for them to e-sign. This waiver is stored in your secure online portal, and we run the background check. Everything happens online, with no printing or scanning. We record their electronic signature to prove their authorization, and we also get a copy of their driver's license and selfie. This keeps you in compliance and protects you from potential litigation. We send you an email alert to let you know the report is ready to review securely on the portal.
Here's what we do:
In this screening package, we run the following checks:
Which Package is Better?
If you're only going to order one screening package, choose the Court Record Package. Why? Since counties around the U.S. have different ways that they report to the national criminal databases, the data can be problematic. Is it then worth running the Triple Database Package at all? Yes—if you also run the court record package. You may be asking, "isn't a national search better than just looking in certain counties or states?" Theoretically, that makes sense. However, Health Street performs our court record searches in a unique way.
To give you the most thorough background report and best possible protection, we send court runners—actual humans—into the country's local courthouses, to research the original records and perform background investigations.
As part of our best practices, we check the records of counties and/or states where the candidate or employee has lived or used their social security number in the past seven years. If you also order a database package, and we discover a crime in a jurisdiction that we haven't yet searched for that individual, we can add a court record search for that region.
Background check packages
In addition to our packages, Health Street provides a la carte background check services to search all types of records, such as work history, professional licenses, health care fraud, references, you name it!
It sounds complicated!
Employment background checks are complicated, but it's easy for you since we do all the work! Simply fill out your electronic application once, have your employees fill out and sign the waiver online, choose your package, and we'll do everything else.
