Employment Screening Companies

  • Employment Screening Companies

Employment Screening Companies

Key List of Main Employment Screening Companies with Full Info on What They Are and How Mistakes Happen!
Background checks for employment screening include criminal records, credit reports, social media checks, driving records, education verification, and past employment verification. We dive into how employment screening companies make mistakes, the damage those mistakes can cause, what the law says, and what you (and we) can do about them.

Today’s job market is competitive. Employers know that they can hire the best. In an effort to hire the best - employers have turned to pre-employment screening services companies for the critical task of performing background checks on job candidates. Employers entrust employment screening companies with the very delicate task of gathering information on potential employees and quickly producing reports on what they discover. Therefore, these employment background check companies have tremendous influence over the career trajectories of and the opportunities available to millions of people. 

Main Employment Screening Companies

We have identified the top employment screening services and listed them below. It is likely that the next time you apply for a job, your potential employer will ask you to give one of these employment background screening companies permission to dive into your background and produce a report on you. Or maybe they already have.

We encourage you to search for employment screening services reviews for the above national employment screening services. If one of the above companies has already done a screening on you and that report is not accurate, you should contact us right away. Remember, even the best employment background check companies hired by the best employers can make mistakes. 

But because of the pressure on employment background screening services to do things quickly and the volume of employment screening services they must perform, mistakes happen. Even the best employment screening services rely on technology and automated systems to gather, sort, and sift through huge amounts of data. This mechanized approach might be efficient, but it is susceptible to inaccuracies. 

Mistakes in criminal background checks, credit reports, and employment histories happen with far greater frequency than they should. Even the best employment screening companies send employers reports with inaccuracies that can range from misidentifications to misspellings to outdated information to incomplete information. These inaccuracies have devastating consequences for job candidates.

As consumer lawyers, we see these mistakes and the damage they can create every day. For example, a mistaken criminal record might wrongfully label an innocent job seeker as a felon or an error in credit history might unjustly portray a candidate as financially irresponsible. Candidates find themselves unjustly rejected for positions with their professional reputations tarnished. The emotional toll is equally significant; the frustration and helplessness of being penalized for errors they did not commit can be overwhelming. Furthermore, these mistakes can lead to prolonged unemployment, compounding financial stress and impacting mental health.

What Is an Employment Screening Service and What Do They Do?

An employment screening company is a company or agency that conducts background checks on potential employees on behalf of employers. When hiring, employers pay a background check company to confirm that the people they intend to hire are reliable and are who they say they are. 

Employment screening services verify information such as a job candidate’s criminal records, employment history, and educational qualifications. Certain jobs will require a check of a candidate’s credit history from the main credit reporting agencies, motor vehicle and driving records, and sometimes drug testing results. The primary objective is to ensure the candidate was honest through the application process and to assess any potential risks the candidate might pose. Employers want to maintain workplace safety, maintain client safety, and safeguard their reputation.

How do Background Screening Report Errors Happen?

Even the best employment screening companies using the best employment screening practices can result in mistakes. Clerical errors, typos, and retrieving data from outdated or wrong databases can cause inaccuracies in your background screening report. 

  • Incorrect Personal Information: Minor spelling errors or misplaced digits in your name, your date of birth, your address, or your Social Security number lead to misidentification and confusion with individuals who have similar names or identifiers. The result is an inaccurate report.
  • Inaccurate Employment History: Employment screening reports can contain errors in your work history. The omission of a job on a report or inaccurately reported dates can have severe consequences.
  • Education Background Errors: Your educational qualifications, such as degrees and certifications, can also contain inaccuracies. This obviously affects your job prospects.
  • Identity Theft: If you have been the victim of identity theft, any provider of background information (including tenant screening and credit screening) must correct any errors in your report caused by the theft.
  • Criminal Record Errors: These range from falsely reporting arrests as convictions, reporting convictions that were later expunged, and inaccurately attributing criminal records to the wrong person with a similar name. The results are devastating.
  • Inaccurate Financial Information: Wrong balance amounts in existing credit lines, incorrect account statuses (such as closed instead of open), loans in forbearance or deferment reported as delinquent, reporting derogatory accounts older than seven years, incorrectly reporting accounts as charged off or in collections, reinsertion of previously deleted accounts, repossessions that never happened, paid accounts reporting as outstanding debt, and misreported payment histories (such as late payments reported as current) will all affect your creditworthiness. (Inaccurate credit reports can result in a whole new host of problems. Contact a credit report lawyer for help with this.)

What the Law Says About These Mistakes

When mistakes happen, a federal law called the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) requires these employment screening report companies to investigate and correct any information you dispute. Whether you have been the victim of identity theft, or just the victim of reporting errors, when you seek to correct the damage, background check companies must comply.

One of the challenges in disputing background checks is that the process to dispute inaccuracies can be time-consuming, the burden to prove the inaccuracy is on the applicant, and employment screening companies don’t always comply with the rules. In the competitive and fast-paced world of job hunting, opportunities come and go quickly. An employment screening error can and often does result in missed chances, as fixing records might not line up with an employer’s hiring timelines. 

However, before an employer can not hire you, it must provide you with a notice called a “pre-adverse action” notice. In that notice, the employer must tell you the exact information in the employment screening report that prompted it to not hire you. 

Though an employer must provide you with this notice, employers are not required to hire you for the position in question or any other position, even if your background check errors are ultimately cleared up. The law recognizes that the employer’s decision was made in good faith based on the background check report. But, the employment screening company can be held accountable for its role in erroneously causing the denial in the first place.

Information on Employment Screening Companies

When it is time to dispute a background check, the employment screening company must provide you with a copy of the report. The FCRA requires them to do this. If they don’t do this, you have grounds for a lawsuit. 

Most employment screening companies must provide you with a free copy of your background screening report every year. You can contact them, request a copy of your employment screening report, review that report before you apply for jobs, and then correct any errors before a potential employer looks at them. This can be a time-consuming process.

Contact Us

Contact Consumer Attorneys if you have any questions about employment screening companies, if an employment screening company has failed to correct an error in a background report, or if you have lost an opportunity due to an error in a background check. 

Contact us by:

  • You can chat with a live representative or fill out a form to be contacted. 
  • Emailing us at +1 877-615-1725.

We have helped thousands of people with errors in their background checks and credit reports. We know the law, and we know how to get the attention of background screening companies. Sometimes, that requires a lawsuit. If that’s the case, we will represent you and support you until you get the compensation you deserve. 

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