[David Cole]

It is a real shame that this ever happened and could have been avoided. I started writing this post to say that there should be repurcussions for the company that provided the background check report but the more I think about it perhaps significant blame could potentially lie with the employer as it is they who ultimately dictate which checks are to be performed.

In most countries outside of the US this case would be black and white with regards to who was at fault (the background check provider) but without a centralised police registry in the US for criminal record checking purposes presumeably it is up to employers to decide which of the county and state court checks are to be performed and whether or not to include a federal criminal search. Screening providers can really only provide best practice recommendations.

[Terry Corley]

Screening providers in the US generally make best practice recommendations to employers but at the end of the day there is a large percentage of employers that will make their own decision as to what the type of actual criminal checks is done based on cost. More times than we'd like to see, buyers of these services will make a decision based on overall cost basis versus balancing the risks associated with doing say a U.S. National Criminal Database search as the primary criminal history tool and nothing else versus searching the counties in the places the subject has lived, worked, or gone to school over a seven year period. U.S. Nat Crim products are primarily designed to be used as a canvas net to ID possible records located from disparate locations around the U.S. (using aggregated data) and not as a primary source to make an informed hiring decision. I'd be curious to learn what type of check HR Plus actually did. Even a Nat crim should have turned something up on this individual unless it wasn't processed properly.

David Cole, on 15 November 2011 - 03:32 PM, said:

It is a real shame that this ever happened and could have been avoided. I started writing this post to say that there should be repurcussions for the company that provided the background check report but the more I think about it perhaps significant blame could potentially lie with the employer as it is they who ultimately dictate which checks are to be performed.

In most countries outside of the US this case would be black and white with regards to who was at fault (the background check provider) but without a centralised police registry in the US for criminal record checking purposes presumeably it is up to employers to decide which of the county and state court checks are to be performed and whether or not to include a federal criminal search. Screening providers can really only provide best practice recommendations.

[W Casem]

Information Resources Employment Screening at it's FINEST. www.irverify.com