Background checks are standard for most companies in the United States. In some sectors, like education and financial services, background screening is actually required by government regulations. Even in cases where background checks are not mandated, they can help minimize a company’s risk for legal exposure and could reduce attrition by ensuring than an applicant is a suitable fit for the position.

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We’ve written in the past about degree/diploma mills, which are fake colleges/universities that sell education credentials to help job applicants pad their resumes.

Fortunately, the private sector has collaborated with the U.S. Dept of Education in developing resources to reveal institutions that are not accredited, weeding out counterfeit degrees.

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A number of employers are addressing the rapidly changing environment of medical marijuana laws in the United States by taking part in an assessment of their workplace drug policies.

Actually, most of these organizations are considering including stipulations in their policy that directly addresses medical (and sometimes recreational) marijuana use by employees.

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We’ve all see the recent spate of EEOC lawsuits alleging that companies have engaged in discriminatory hiring practices because the companies chose not to hire people with criminal records and this practice disproportionately excluded people from protected classes. And now, several state attorneys are opposing the EEOC’s guidelines and latest lawsuits.

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Background screening flaw gets national public attention

On a recent Today Show segment that criticized background screening companies for supplying inaccurate data to their clients, the report featured a woman who was denied employment at the Red Cross.

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Innovative Response to Market Demand is Making Waves by Challenging Long-Held Industry Standard

For as long as the modern background screening industry has existed, companies in our space have been selling county criminal records to their clients and they have been doing so using a sales technique called “unlimited counties.”

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It was just reported yesterday that the New Horizons Medical Institue in Athens, GA hired a convicted felon, who fleeced them for $55,000.

Wendy Steen Fischer was on parole from a 2009 conviction on charges she embezzled about $250,000 from two Athens medical practices, but officials at New Horizons Medical Institute were unaware of her rap sheet when they hired her in 2012.

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Starting on July 20, 2013, companies with any employees who work at least half-time in the City of Seattle may no longer include a criminal history question on their employment applications. Additionally, employers can no longer maintain a blanket policy to exclude from employment all individuals with arrest or conviction records.

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House Enrolled Act 1482 updates Indiana’s criminal records law

Indiana Governor Mike Pence enacted a new law, effective July 1, 2013, that permits individuals arrested or convicted of certain crimes to have those records sealed.

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