Employment Background Checks: Be Aware Of Your Rights Before Your Next Job Search

If you're starting a job search, have you considered the background checks potential employers may run on you? According to the Society for Human Resources Management, with 96 percent of all human resources staff running background checks on new and potential employees, chances are pretty good that it will happen.

A recent survey conducted by the Los Angeles Times tells us that one-third of these checks are credit checks. The potential employer performs the rest, which include news reports, sex-offender status and criminal record checks, in order to ensure that an applicant didn't lie during his interview or in his resume. For someone who's in the middle of a job search, quality career advice concerning your rights is extremely important, and it should be one of the first things you investigate.

Permission Is Necessary

According to the career advice given by the Privacy Rights Clearinghouse, a nonprofit organization dedicated to consumer information and advocacy, employers must receive written permission before running any checks. Additionally, if they don't hire you because of a bad report, they have to give you the name of the company that provided the bad report. Of course, there's a common loophole for businesses that run the checks themselves, but before you start your job search, you might want to get a free copy of these reports to help protect yourself.

Checks Are Limited

In the United States, the Fair Credit Reporting Act outlines the standards for employers when doing background checks on job candidates. You'll want to be aware of these before starting your job search. In addition, background checks can include a simple credit check or a number of different reports, such as your driving records and criminal history as well as interviews with friends, neighbors and others who know you well.

Some information that is not accessible by your employer, however, includes:

-- Tax liens paid and older than 7 years

-- Civil-court cases that are 7 years or more from the entry date

-- Bankruptcies older than 10 years

-- Bad accounts older than 7 years

In general, anything that has been released or is available in public is fair game.

Dealing with False Information

During a job-search and application process, it's not unusual for recruiters to pull up negative information through Google and even through regular checks. However, some recruiters will investigate further to find out if there is any truth to the negative reviews. Unfortunately, ask anyone for career advice on the matter, and he'll tell you that these false positives may be enough to cut you out of the running for a job.

The Privacy Rights Clearinghouse cites instances where individuals were unemployable for years because of a false criminal record due to identity theft. In fact, the organization is collecting reports for those who have lost employment because of incorrect reports, so you'll want to contact them if you think this is happening to you.

Anticipate Problems

Identity theft and black marks on your record are difficult to clear. Regardless of how these marks on your past got there, they will damage your credibility and employability.

Take the time to do background checks on yourself and make sure you're aware of exactly what your potential employers will see when they review your reports. If you do this before you start your job search, you can usually address and eliminate many problems. Many people who give career advice professionally will tell you to prepare yourself to answer the questions your potential employer will ask about the issues you can't eliminate.

Start with a free credit report from places like TransUnion, Experian and Equifax, which have nationwide, approved reporting agencies. The other option is for you to go through an actual background-check service that will look through various reports such as the national sex-offender search, criminal records, education verification, previous employment, Social Security address and the FBI terrorist database.

You'll find that doing these checks yourself and dealing with everything before you start your job search will significantly improve your chances at landing a job. At the very least, you'll be aware of what could be keeping you from getting a job and give you the chance to collect some solid information about dealing with those issues. This can mean all the difference when it comes to landing one of those $100K dream jobs.