FIVE REASONS TO NEVER RUN AN EMPLOYEE BACKGROUND CHECK
You don’t need to know who you hire!
I don’t know why managers and owners think they need to run an employee background check! I mean, it’s not like people lie during an interview. All you have to do is ask if they have ever committed any crimes, and legally they have to tell you the truth. Furthermore, I’ve never met anyone who has lied to me about something so important. I’ve hired hundreds of people and not a single one has ever stolen THAT much from me. I mean, come on, what’s a few thousand dollars amongst friends?
Managers always have psychic abilities.
Part of being a manager is to pass a psychic exam; not to be confused with a physiological exam, which would disqualify about half… but our mental state is not in question right now. Why should you waste time and effort in a pre-employment screening when you have managers that can predict the future with complete certainty? All of my managers carry mini crystal balls, which you can go get from the Wal-Mart now; they’re real fancy, not like those fake crystal balls from the infomercials. The point is that there’s absolutely no need for you to worry about anything. You’re mangers have your back on this one, there’s no need to fret over employee background checks.
You can afford a little shrink now and then.
Seriously, what’s it matter if you lose a few bucks here and there. Maybe you should pay your employees more if they’re always stealing from you. That’s all an employee background check is going to tell you, anyway! It’ll just show all the low-down places that poor guy or girl had to steal from just to make ends meet before landing on your doorstep! Cut them some slack, will ya!
Customers aren’t really that important.
Sure, they give you money, keep you and your employees paid and are essentially your business’s life blood, but other than that they can just be a down-right annoyance! If you use a pre-employee screening you might only hire people that care about the customers. That mean that all those rude customers who want you to wait on them hand and foot will just keeping coming back. How are you supposed to work under those conditions!
Why waste time building a culture of honesty?
The only thing a pre-employment screening will do for your business is to help foster a culture of honesty, integrity and hard work that pays off. Why on Earth would any business want that? I don’t want the same employees hanging around for years, as I’m pretty sure they’d end up stealing way too much. Turnover is good for a business, no matter what those so called “experts” say. Forego the employee background check process I say. Hiring should be like a box of chocolates (who doesn’t love chocolates?)!!
For more information about Employee Background Checks contact us or call 1.770.426.0547.
You don’t need to know who you hire!
I don’t know why managers and owners think they need to run an employee background check! I mean, it’s not like people lie during an interview. All you have to do is ask if they have ever committed any crimes, and legally they have to tell you the truth. Furthermore, I’ve never met anyone who has lied to me about something so important. I’ve hired hundreds of people and not a single one has ever stolen THAT much from me. I mean, come on, what’s a few thousand dollars amongst friends?
Managers always have psychic abilities.
Part of being a manager is to pass a psychic exam; not to be confused with a physiological exam, which would disqualify about half… but our mental state is not in question right now. Why should you waste time and effort in a pre-employment screening when you have managers that can predict the future with complete certainty? All of my managers carry mini crystal balls, which you can go get from the Wal-Mart now; they’re real fancy, not like those fake crystal balls from the infomercials. The point is that there’s absolutely no need for you to worry about anything. You’re mangers have your back on this one, there’s no need to fret over employee background checks.
You can afford a little shrink now and then.
Seriously, what’s it matter if you lose a few bucks here and there. Maybe you should pay your employees more if they’re always stealing from you. That’s all an employee background check is going to tell you, anyway! It’ll just show all the low-down places that poor guy or girl had to steal from just to make ends meet before landing on your doorstep! Cut them some slack, will ya!
Customers aren’t really that important.
Sure, they give you money, keep you and your employees paid and are essentially your business’s life blood, but other than that they can just be a down-right annoyance! If you use a pre-employee screening you might only hire people that care about the customers. That means that all those rude customers who want you to wait on them hand and foot will just keep coming back. How are you supposed to work under those conditions!
Why waste time building a culture of honesty?
The only thing a pre-employment screening will do for your business is to help foster a culture of honesty, integrity and hard work that pays off. Why on Earth would any business want that? I don’t want the same employees hanging around for years, as I’m pretty sure they’d end up stealing way too much. Turnover is good for a business, no matter what those so called “experts” say. Forego the employee background check process I say. Hiring should be like a box of chocolates (who doesn’t love chocolates?)!!
For more information about Employee Background Checks, contact us or call 1.770.426.0547.
EMPLOYEE BACKGROUND CHECKS AND THE EFFECTS THEY HAVE ON SHRINK
A core part of my job is investigating employee theft. Even with stringent hiring practices, constant training and always conducting employee background checks prior to hiring someone, dishonest employees are always a problem. It’s a game of statistics, really. I have 30 stores in my region. 70 or so employees at each store location. That’s a little over 2,000 employees. If just 5% of employees will steal something (and that’s being very conservative) that means at any given time, about 100 employees in my region will be engaging in nefarious activities. That means a great deal of my time is spent investigating and resolving these types of thefts. That all means that there are numerous folks that are terminated for theft.
I was looking for a new computer recently and decided to try out a new electronics store that had recently come into the market. I start browsing and an employee comes up behind me and asks if I need help. As I turn around, I (and her) quickly realize that our paths have crossed once before. She had stolen quite a substantial amount of product from my store about a year ago. I guess this new store doesn’t see a benefit in pre-employment screening. I decide I don’t want a computer from the store and head out. As I’m leaving, I hear a voice yell my name. I look over and an old high school buddy of mine is actually the manager of the store. I walk over to chat a bit.
The conversation ultimately goes to what I’m up to, and I mention that his salesperson wasn’t the most honest when she worked for my company. Looking like I just shot his dog, he confesses that the one thing he does not like about the company is that they do not run an employee background check on potential candidates. He also tells me that the same team member is suspected of stealing speakers, but they don’t have cameras in the store either. For a minute, I thought I had traveled into some alternate dimension where shrink wasn’t a concern for brick and mortar retailers.
I don’t know what became of that employee. I never did return to that store. Not because I morally disagreed with their LP practices. I don’t care if a store doesn’t do a thorough pre-employment screening; it’s not my company. The reason I didn’t make a purchase was the prices were just too high. I could buy the same item down the road at a competitor for 15-20% less. Could their higher prices be a sign that they are struggling to profit? Could that grasp for profit come from shrink? Maybe.
Think of your own business and your own customers. You always want to provide customers with the best possible experience; most often, that means having the lowest price around. As a retailer, you have to do all that is in your power to keep operating costs down in order to maximize the profit out of every item you sell. Part of that equation is limiting your exposure to shrink. Just as you apply security tags to high theft items, you should use an employee background check to prevent bad apples from being introduced into your basket. A simple and painless pre-employment screening can really make the difference of using red ink, or black on your next P+L.
Employee Background Check is important and we can help you with it. Call 1.770.426.0547 and let’s talk.
A core part of my job is investigating employee theft. Even with stringent hiring practices, constant training and always conducting employee background checks prior to hiring someone, dishonest employees are always a problem. It’s a game of statistics, really. I have 30 stores in my region. 70 or so employees at each store location. That’s a little over 2,000 employees. If just 5% of employees will steal something (and that’s being very conservative) that means at any given time, about 100 employees in my region will be engaging in nefarious activities. That means a great deal of my time is spent investigating and resolving these types of thefts. That all means that there are numerous folks that are terminated for theft.
I was looking for a new computer recently and decided to try out a new electronics store that had recently come into the market. I start browsing and an employee comes up behind me and asks if I need help. As I turn around, I (and her) quickly realize that our paths have crossed once before. She had stolen quite a substantial amount of product from my store about a year ago. I guess this new store doesn’t see a benefit in pre-employment screening. I decide I don’t want a computer from the store and head out. As I’m leaving, I hear a voice yell my name. I look over and an old high school buddy of mine is actually the manager of the store. I walk over to chat a bit.
The conversation ultimately goes to what I’m up to, and I mention that his salesperson wasn’t the most honest when she worked for my company. Looking like I just shot his dog, he confesses that the one thing he does not like about the company is that they do not run an employee background check on potential candidates. He also tells me that the same team member is suspected of stealing speakers, but they don’t have cameras in the store either. For a minute, I thought I had traveled into some alternate dimension where shrink wasn’t a concern for brick and mortar retailers.
I don’t know what became of that employee. I never did return to that store. Not because I morally disagreed with their LP practices. I don’t care if a store doesn’t do a thorough pre-employment screening; it’s not my company. The reason I didn’t make a purchase was the prices were just too high. I could buy the same item down the road at a competitor for 15-20% less. Could their higher prices be a sign that they are struggling to profit? Could that grasp for profit come from shrink? Maybe.
Think of your own business and your own customers. You always want to provide customers with the best possible experience; most often, that means having the lowest price around. As a retailer, you have to do all that is in your power to keep operating costs down in order to maximize the profit out of every item you sell. Part of that equation is limiting your exposure to shrink. Just as you apply security tags to high theft items, you should use an employee background check to prevent bad apples from being introduced into your basket. A simple and painless pre-employment screening can really make the difference of using red ink, or black on your next P+L.
Employee Background Check is important and we can help you with it. Call 1.770.426.0547 and let’s talk.
EMPLOYEE BACKGROUND CHECKS ARE LIKE A WATER FILTER
So, I share an office with a General Manager at my home store. It’s a rather large office, tucked away in the rear of the store. He has a large desk. I have a large desk. We both face opposing corners and hardly see each other and he’s a pretty quiet guy. The bad part though, is that managers will often use the office to conduct interviews; even though there are two other offices in the store! Listening to how some managers conduct interviews makes me happy that we always conduct an employee background check on potential candidates.
A pre-employment screening is absolutely a necessity. You can’t leave everything in the hands of managers who may, or may not possess the interview skills needed to weed through a host of candidates.
Last week, I’m twiddling away on a case when a manager comes into my office with a potential hire for the store. I sit back quietly reviewing CCTV and typing my narrative and I can’t help but to be more interested in how this manager interviews a potential employee. For 25 minutes, this manager, a tenured manager who has been around for a decade or more, talks about his expectations. The manager talked for 25 minutes. I couldn’t tell you what this candidate sounded like because the manager did all the talking. The only time the candidate said anything was the resounding YES! When offered a position in the store.
Befuddled, I asked this manager what he learned from the candidate during the interview. He didn’t quite know what to make of my question. In his mind, he was a great interviewer. Side note, this manager has the highest turnover rate in the store. I asked if he treated every candidate the same and he said he did. Boy, am I sure glad we run employee background checks as a safety net.
Some managers just aren’t good interviewers. They don’t know what questions to ask, and they may even ask questions they shouldn’t. A solid pre-employment screening process can help filter out dead weight your managers may let slip by during the interview process.
Think of an employee background check like a three step water filter. The water passes through an initial screen to take out any contaminants. Next, it goes through a process that removes the “hardness” and finally, a good system will pass the water through a UV light, killing any virus or bacteria that may have taken up residence. Your hiring practices should do the same. A good application is your first step. The right questions can weed out anyone not in line with your business. Second, an interview with a manager that knows how to ask questions and really gets to understand and feel out a person in a 30 minute time frame. Lastly, a pre-employment screening/background check is your UV light to the hiring process.
From the great Doctor Gregory House, “everybody lies. Job interviews are not immune to fibbers. Don’t let the toxic bacteria filled water into your business. Kill the possibility by always conducting an employee background check!
Need information on Employee Background Check. Give us a call at 1.770.426.0547 now.
So, I share an office with a General Manager at my home store. It’s a rather large office, tucked away in the rear of the store. He has a large desk. I have a large desk. We both face opposing corners and hardly see each other and he’s a pretty quiet guy. The bad part though, is that managers will often use the office to conduct interviews; even though there are two other offices in the store! Listening to how some managers conduct interviews makes me happy that we always conduct an employee background check on potential candidates.
A pre-employment screening is absolutely a necessity. You can’t leave everything in the hands of managers who may, or may not possess the interview skills needed to weed through a host of candidates.
Last week, I’m twiddling away on a case when a manager comes into my office with a potential hire for the store. I sit back quietly reviewing CCTV and typing my narrative and I can’t help but to be more interested in how this manager interviews a potential employee. For 25 minutes, this manager, a tenured manager who has been around for a decade or more, talks about his expectations. The manager talked for 25 minutes. I couldn’t tell you what this candidate sounded like because the manager did all the talking. The only time the candidate said anything was the resounding YES! When offered a position in the store.
Befuddled, I asked this manager what he learned from the candidate during the interview. He didn’t quite know what to make of my question. In his mind, he was a great interviewer. Side note, this manager has the highest turnover rate in the store. I asked if he treated every candidate the same and he said he did. Boy, am I sure glad we run employee background checks as a safety net.
Some managers just aren’t good interviewers. They don’t know what questions to ask, and they may even ask questions they shouldn’t. A solid pre-employment screening process can help filter out dead weight your managers may let slip by during the interview process.
Think of an employee background check like a three step water filter. The water passes through an initial screen to take out any contaminants. Next, it goes through a process that removes the “hardness” and finally, a good system will pass the water through a UV light, killing any virus or bacteria that may have taken up residence. Your hiring practices should do the same. A good application is your first step. The right questions can weed out anyone not in line with your business. Second, an interview with a manager that knows how to ask questions and really gets to understand and feel out a person in a 30 minute time frame. Lastly, a pre-employment screening/background check is your UV light to the hiring process.
From the great Doctor Gregory House, “everybody lies”. Job interviews are not immune to fibbers. Don’t let the toxic bacteria filled water into your business. Kill the possibility by always conducting an employee background check!
Need information on Employee Background Check. Give us a call at 1.770.426.0547 now.
Pre-employment Screening- 5 WC Blog 193
Background Check Company-5
Interviewing Skills Are Not Enough; Employee Background Checks Can
Prevent Poor Hiring Choices Part 2
In part 1 I discussed how employers think they can rely on their interview skills in order to try to find the best candidate for a job (and not do so well). I also talked about how an employer might need specific job skills or certifications for a position they wish to fill and how a Background Check Company can verify training, schooling and certifications. In part 2 of this article, I want to discuss the advantages that a Background Check Company may offer that can help you avoid asking the wrong interview questions and still get the information you need.
A Background Check Company is one that can investigate a potential new employee through a pre-employment screening and validate information they have provided in a job application or on a resume. Business owners may not have the expertise to ask the necessary questions that will lead to making a sound hiring decision. A Background Check Company can confirm employment dates an applicant has listed for a prior job. If your potential new hire will be working with financial transactions, a pre-employment screening can reveal if a candidate has liens or bankruptcies or judgements against him/her. Such revelations could determine if this might be a red flag issue for you. There are a significant number of areas a properly completed background check can validate or disprove an applicant’s claims.
If you are unfamiliar with procedures and guidelines for hiring employees and conducting interviews, you could easily ask interview questions that could lead to discrimination lawsuits even if your intent was harmless. For example, you might be curious as to whether the applicant was in the military because you served. You might be interested in where they have lived in the past because you enjoy travelling. Perhaps the applicant seems to be your age and you are curious to know about their age. All of these questions could be harmless in your mind, but at the same time illegal to ask.
According to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), “As a general rule, the information obtained and requested through the pre-employment process should be limited to those essential for determining if a person is qualified for the job; whereas information regarding race, sex, national origin, age and religion are irrelevant in such determinations.” The specifics on the website can be unclear and so organizations have made lists of questions they say should not be asked by employers during an interview.
According to Prairie View A&M, on pvamu.edu, below is a list of questions that they say may not be asked during an interview:
• Questions regarding foreign addresses which would intentionally or unintentionally indicate national origin
• Whether applicant owns or rents home or lives in an apartment
• Names and relationships of persons with whom applicant resides
• “How old are you?”
• Birth Date
• “Have you ever been arrested?”
• Whether other members of the applicant’s family are U.S. citizens
• “Of what country are you a citizen?”
• Require proof of citizenship prior to employment
• Questions regarding national, race or religious affiliation of schools attended
• Names and addresses of applicant’s relatives
Other areas that one must be careful when inquiring about include organizations an applicant may belong to, military disciplinary action they may have been involved in, and even an applicant’s gender.
By allowing a Background Check Company to conduct pre-employment screenings of candidates, they can focus on verifying the information on an application while the business owner can ask position related questions in an interview. A screening can uncover information a prospective employee may try to hide from a potential employer. It can also help an employer be confident that they truly have hired the best candidate. Hire a pre-employment screening company and get great employees!
Get more information on Background heck Companies, contact us or call 1.770.426.0547 today.
In part 1 I discussed how employers think they can rely on their interview skills in order to try to find the best candidate for a job (and not do so well). I also talked about how an employer might need specific job skills or certifications for a position they wish to fill and how a Background Check Company can verify training, schooling and certifications. In part 2 of this article, I want to discuss the advantages that a Background Check Company may offer that can help you avoid asking the wrong interview questions and still get the information you need.
A Background Check Company is one that can investigate a potential new employee through a pre-employment screening and validate information they have provided in a job application or on a resume. Business owners may not have the expertise to ask the necessary questions that will lead to making a sound hiring decision. A Background Check Company can confirm employment dates an applicant has listed for a prior job. If your potential new hire will be working with financial transactions, a pre-employment screening can reveal if a candidate has liens or bankruptcies or judgements against him/her. Such revelations could determine if this might be a red flag issue for you. There are a significant number of areas a properly completed background check can validate or disprove an applicant’s claims.
If you are unfamiliar with procedures and guidelines for hiring employees and conducting interviews, you could easily ask interview questions that could lead to discrimination lawsuits even if your intent was harmless. For example, you might be curious as to whether the applicant was in the military because you served. You might be interested in where they have lived in the past because you enjoy travelling. Perhaps the applicant seems to be your age and you are curious to know about their age. All of these questions could be harmless in your mind, but at the same time illegal to ask.
According to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), “As a general rule, the information obtained and requested through the pre-employment process should be limited to those essential for determining if a person is qualified for the job; whereas information regarding race, sex, national origin, age and religion are irrelevant in such determinations.” The specifics on the website can be unclear and so organizations have made lists of questions they say should not be asked by employers during an interview.
According to Prairie View A&M, on pvamu.edu, below is a list of questions that they say may not be asked during an interview:
• Questions regarding foreign addresses which would intentionally or unintentionally indicate national origin
• Whether applicant owns or rents home or lives in an apartment
• Names and relationships of persons with whom applicant resides
• “How old are you?”
• Birth Date
• “Have you ever been arrested?”
• Whether other members of the applicant’s family are U.S. citizens
• “Of what country are you a citizen?”
• Require proof of citizenship prior to employment
• Questions regarding national, race or religious affiliation of schools attended
• Names and addresses of applicant’s relatives
Other areas that one must be careful when inquiring about include organizations an applicant may belong to, military disciplinary action they may have been involved in, and even an applicant’s gender.
By allowing a Background Check Company to conduct pre-employment screenings of candidates, they can focus on verifying the information on an application while the business owner can ask position related questions in an interview. A screening can uncover information a prospective employee may try to hide from a potential employer. It can also help an employer be confident that they truly have hired the best candidate. Hire a pre-employment screening company and get great employees!
Get more information on Background heck Companies, contact us or call 1.770.426.0547 today.
Information from the usa.gov website reports a new version of identity theft called synthetic ID theft, is a new twist on an old scam. According to their website, “…a thief steals pieces of information from different people to create a new identity. For example, the thief may steal one person’s social security number, combine it with another person’s name and use someone else’s address to create a brand new identity.” Previously, a thief would simply steal one person’s information and use it to create a new identity. This makes it more important than ever for employers to use a background check company to investigate potential new hires.
Pre-employment screening and employee background checks on job candidates can uncover any number of issues a candidate may be trying to screen from an employer. A background check company uses investigators to search out discrepancies in a job applicant’s resume or application. People will hide information about their driving records, level of education, military service (and discharge status), criminal records and as mentioned above, even their true identity.
I would like to focus attention in this article on the identity verification concern for new hires. Several problems arise when we discuss the issue of identity. If you don’t know who the person is who you have hired, what are you putting at risk in your business? Are you endangering your employees or customers? Are you hiring a person who will steal from you? Do they have a criminal background they are hiding? Another issue is whether or not the individual is even eligible to work in the U.S. If they are not, and you hire them YOU could face fines and penalties from the government.
According to the United States Customs and Immigration Service (USCIS) website, “employers must verify the identity and employment authorization of each person hired after November 6, 1986. Failing to comply with I-9 requirements can cost an employer up to $1,100 for each form not in compliance. In addition, hiring or continuing to employ a person with the knowledge that the person is not authorized to work in the U.S. can result in a penalty of up to $3,200 for the first offense for each worker and for a third offense the penalty can carry a $16,000 penalty for each worker.” What if a new applicant is actually trying to gain employment with you while using a stolen or fake identity? The possibility of incurring these kinds of penalties should be enough to motivate any employer to ensure thorough employee background checks are completed on all applicants.
Employee background checks can include a social security number trace to determine previous addresses, identity and validity. An employment application will contain prior job locations. If someone indicates on the application they worked for such and such a business, located in one area, but the social security number trace shows the applicant never lived in that area, it will be apparent that the applicant has been less than honest in some fashion.
Hopefully the information from the government that I have provided to this point is enough to get you to seriously consider the advantages of hiring a background check company. If however you are still skeptical let me give you one more interesting tidbit from another government website https://www.justice.gov/sites/default/files/crt/legacy/2014/12/04/176.pdf (page 2 last paragraph) answering a question regarding whether an employer should have to conclude an applicant is not authorized to work when a Social Security Number doesn’t match the SSA’s records, their response is “Not necessarily”. They point out that a mismatch between a name and SSA records could be due to a number of reasons including unreported name changes, typing errors, hyphenated names and even identity theft. They say that a mismatch by itself should not be used as the reason for taking any adverse employment action against any employee. The question then becomes should you do something and risk getting in trouble with the Justice Department or do nothing and risk getting in trouble with the USCIS?
A background check company can help you avoid the pitfalls that could lead to unnecessary audits and fines from the government. Pre-employment screening by a trusted source can save you a lot of hiring headaches and give you the confidence that you are hiring the right people for your team.
Pre-employment screening is important and we can help you with it. Call 1.770.426.0547 and let’s talk.
