Saturday, June 27, 2009

How Can I Run an Employee Background Check?

By Glen Pearson

One important part of the hiring process, no matter what industry you're in, is running background checks on your potential employees. That tells you information about applicants that you wouldn't know otherwise, and can be important to finding out whether someone really is the right person for the job.

Employers who decide to skip this important step almost always end up regretting it later. Just running an ordinary background check could allow you to get a full list of information on someone's history. No matter what they did, where they lived, or who they worked for, you'll know about it.

This could be a big help when the time comes to make your decision. Just doing a simple employee background check could help you find an amazing amount of information. It's sad, but some applicants lie on their resumes about previous jobs, or don't mention previous criminal convictions. While you might have hired them if they'd come clean, turning up the information on a background check tells you they're dishonest, and you avoid making a big mistake.

It's also a good idea for applicants to run a background check on themselves to discover exactly what might be brought up in an interview. Believe it or not, it's easy to forget about a part of your past that could come up.

Having your background report on hand before the interview lets you anticipate any and all questions, and you'll be able to decide what the best response is to all of them. You'll also get a better idea what your potential employer does and does not know about you.

So how do you run an employee background check?

It's now easier than ever. You can do it all online without hiring any help from an investigative service.

That's because the Internet contains a number of companies that have put together full background databases on almost everyone. Just log into the site, enter the name you want to inquire about, and you'll get all the information available on that person.

You will pay a small fee for the service, but it's worth it. You have two basic options - paying once for a single background check, and again for each subsequent one, and paying a flat membership fee for unlimited checks. Since the membership is usually only about two or three times what a single report costs, it's the best idea for employers.

Any company that wants to be sure they hire the right applicant should be sure to include a background check as part of the employee screening process. This is an inexpensive and easy method, but it's very effective.

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