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Criminal Background Check

Secret Policies of Criminal Background Checks

One of the most important aspects of running a business is hiring trustworthy employees who will help a company to flourish. Running criminal background checks on all prospective hirees is a standard practice for most employers. Whether you’re the one looking into someone’s background or you are the person whose background is being looked into, there are certain rules that should be known, understood, and followed when undergoing this process.

In this article, we will discuss what a criminal background check entails and a few of the policies regarding these types of checks that you might not know about.

Some Information on Criminal Background Checks

There are several different types of background checks. When someone runs a background check, they can usually comb through almost every monumental factor of a person’s life, from their marriage records to their debts and assets, and any criminal background.

Criminal records are important in the decision to hire a prospective employee because an employer wants to know the details concerning a person’s arrests, convictions, or time that they’ve spent in prison. Using this information, employers can more easily ascertain whether someone is trustworthy enough and capable of a certain job position within their company.

Criminal background checks take information from court records, crime databases, police records, sex offender registries, and terrorist watch lists and present it to whomever is running the background check.

Policies for Criminal Background Checks

As an employer, when it comes to running a criminal background check, it’s important to know what your limitations are. Similarly, as a prospective employee, it’s important to know your rights concerning criminal background checks that are run against you. Here’s a list of 5 policies that you may not know about:

Notification

Federal law requires that an employer must notify a job candidate if they are going to conduct a criminal background check. To run a background check without the candidate’s permission is illegal and can have serious repercussions.

Disqualification

If you choose to disqualify a job applicant because of their criminal history or you were disqualified from a job position and want to know why, federal law requires an employer to tell a prospective candidate the reason for their disqualification.

Furthermore, a person can be disqualified from a certain job on the basis of their criminal history only if a certain criminal offense is directly related to the job itself. For example, if someone has a criminal history of embezzlement or fraud, then an employer is justified in not hiring them for a job where the employee will be put in a position of dealing with money and funds.

Discrimination

Under no circumstances, can you, as a prospective hiree, be discriminated against simply because you have a criminal record. If you’re an employer, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission ensures that you cannot make a policy whereby your company will refuse to hire anyone with a past history of crime.

Time limit

In most states, criminal records are publicly available for anywhere between 7-10 years before they are no longer made accessible to the public eye. So, if you’re conducting a criminal background check, you should take into consideration that the information you receive may be incomplete.

Inappropriate questions

Sometimes, an employer may try to ask you questions that aren’t answered by a criminal background check. While some questions are perfectly legal to ask, others are not. For instance, if an employer asks you if you’ve ever been arrested but not convicted, or if you have any convictions that have been sealed or expunged, you are not usually under any legal obligation to respond.

Employee Criminal Record Check

Where We Come In

Now that you have read about some of the lesser-known policies regarding criminal background checks, you might be asking what the next step is. Fortunately for you, Affordable Background Checks is here to help. Whether you are an employer who wants to run a criminal background check on a potential job hiree, or you are interested in seeing what your criminal record has to say about you, we can provide the information that you’re looking for at an affordable price.

If you are interested in conducting a criminal background check or taking advantage of any of our other background check services, please don’t hesitate to contact us for details.

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Gavin Muirhead

Gavin Muirhead has been involved in developing products for background checks and improving online experiences in the background screening industry since 2012. He is the lead author and editor of Affordable Background Checks.