A background investigation is a process of compiling and looking up commercial records, criminal records, civil filings and financial records. Background investigations are often requested on job candidates, seeking security job positions or any trust related work such as in a hospitals, airport, military services, financial companies, schools etc. Before a couple of years these investigations are traditionally administered only by the government companies and agencies, but now this service is available online through various websites.

The results of background investigation may include financial statements and score, current and the past address details, past employment verification, list of neighbors, criminal history records, arrests and warrants records, conviction and incarceration, felonies and misdemeanor records, list of associates and even the neighborhood statistics. The background investigation helps in the process of investigating the potential of an employee, character, fitness, and qualifications of the candidate. The screening also helps the employer to verify the accuracy of an applicant’s claims, to discover any possible compensation claims, criminal history or employer sanctions.

To test the potential candidate or employee, the employer must run the following checks; Education verification- degree, professional qualification, school grades obtained or not; Employment References; Gaps in job history; verification of directorship; bankruptcies and credit details; address verification; identity clearance check; criminal history report; skills assessment; patriot act searches etc. The most successful online search website Net Detective is found to display all these information in just minutes with high accuracy rate.

Employee background check helps the employer to avoid the following, workplace violence- by knowing the history of criminal actions help to predict the major violence in the working place. Research says that 1 in 10 applicants have criminal action record history; sexual harassment, financial loss and theft avoidance- about 15% of employment proposals admit to have to theft of merchandise; unqualified applicants-over 40% of applications have fake resume and material falsehoods; time wastage in recruiting and training the unqualified applicants.

Tags: Employment, Job Positions, Recruiting

This entry was posted on September 9, 2010 at 8:43 pm and is filed under Employment Investigations. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.