What Should You Look For When You Conduct a Background Check?

If you are taking a look at applicants, you might be wondering who you should run a background check on. Ideally, you would like to run a background check on everyone. In actuality, background checks can be expensive, and you are probably only going to run background checks on people who you are seriously considering for an open position. As a result, you want to use the best background check possible. With the vast majority of companies running background checks on people they are considering for open positions, you need to know what to look for. What are the items that you should consider if you are conducting a background check?

Look for Signs of a Criminal Record First

Without a doubt, the most important element that you need to consider is the presence of a criminal record. Of course, being convicted of a crime does not necessarily make someone a bad person. On the other hand, if you are responsible for the actions of an employee, you do not want to place your other employees or customers in harm’s way unnecessarily. In addition to hurting other people, this could place the company in an awkward position. Remember that an applicant cannot be turned down because of the presence of a criminal record alone. On the other hand, an employer could turn down someone if the offense committed is directly related to the duties of the position. This means that the specific nature of the crime could make you a liability to the company. For example, if someone was convicted of theft and the open position was at a bank, this would be an issue.

Therefore, what should you look for if you are conducting a criminal background check? First, you should take a look at felony convictions. Are there any felony convictions present? If so, what are they? Then, you should look at federal crimes as well. These are separate from state crimes, which make up the majority of convictions. In addition, you should also take a look and see if the individual is a registered sex offender. That might be relevant to the open position.

If you are doing a deep background check, you may check other criminal records as well. For example, there may be information listed on the global homeland security database. Or, you may even pull up an international criminal history. Be sure to consider these criminal records as well, as they can be important.

Confirm Someone’s Identity

This may sound like it is superfluous. After all, you require people to produce a photo ID, don’t you? You even ask them for their social security number if you are hiring someone, right? Unfortunately, technology has made it easy to steal someone’s identity. Therefore, you need to make sure that someone is who they say they are. Why would someone lie about their identity on an employment application? Perhaps they are collecting benefits that may disappear if they got another job. For this reason, you should also confirm someone’s identity as part of a background check.

Don’t Forget About a Credit Check

Finally, you may also want to conduct a credit check as well. A credit check is important for positions that involve money management. If an applicant is going to be managing the company’s money, you want to make sure they can manage their own money well. If they cannot manage their own money well, how are they going to be able to manage the money of the company? Therefore, you need to order a credit check. Make sure the credit report is accurate. If you see any issues on the credit report, you may want to check with the applicant to make sure these are completely understood before moving forward.

Conduct a Thorough Background Check Before Hiring Someone

Ultimately, these are a few of the most important factors that you need to consider if you are conducting a background check on a potential candidate. Make sure that you have all the information you needed to make a proper hiring decision. Conducting a dive into someone’s background can help you make the right choice.