(Click on the logos above for more information on these programs)

On February 9, 2012 the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) announced that Self Check, a free online service of E-Verify that allows workers to check their own employment eligibility status, is now available in all 50 states, Washington, D.C., Guam, Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands and the Commonwealth of Northern Mariana Islands.

The program was launched in March 2011 by Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano and USCIS Director Alejandro Mayorkas, with the goal of expanding Self Check nationally within one year.

Since the initial launch in March, approximately 67,000 people have used Self Check and anticipation that participation will dramatically increase with service now available to individuals across the country.

Self Check was developed through a partnership between the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the Social Security Administration (SSA) to provide individuals a tool to check their own employment eligibility status, as well as guidance on how to correct their DHS and SSA records. It is the first online E-Verify service offered directly to workers. Available in English and Spanish, Self Check enables individuals to enter the same information into Self Check that employers enter into E-Verify.

. . . and now for the rest of the story.

FAQ’s for Self Check:

• May I require my employees, or potential employees, to use Self Check?
No. You may not require your employees or potential employees to use Self Check under any circumstances. Requiring applicants to provide proof of their employment authorization before establishing an employment relationship is known as “pre-screening” and it may constitute a violation of the anti-discrimination provision of the Immigration and Nationality Act. Additionally, you may not require an employee, once hired, to use Self Check. You may use the E-Verify program to verify the work eligibility of hired employees. More information about E-Verify can be found here: www.dhs.gov/E-Verify. There is also a link to the E-Verify site in the right navigation bar.

• If a new employee has used Self Check, does a Form I-9 still need to be completed?
Yes. A “work authorization confirmed” from Self Check does not take the place of the Form I-9 requirement. Newly hired individuals must still fill out Section 1 of the Form I-9 and present unexpired work authorization documents. You, as the employer, must examine the documents presented and fill out Section 2 of the Form I-9.

• If a new worker has used Self Check, must I still create a case in E-Verify for that employee?
Yes. If your company participates in E-Verify you must create a case in E-Verify for all newly hired individuals, including those who may have used Self Check. Self Check does not provide users with a work authorization credential. Please remember that you can never under any circumstance require a worker (current or potential) to use Self Check.

• If Self Check shows that an employee is authorized to work, am I protected from any future claims that I hired an unauthorized worker?
No. Self Check does not create a legal presumption that the employer has not violated immigration law.

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Unsure if your company is following guidelines set by the FCRA?  Call Credential Check and we’ll help you take inventory of your hiring process!

CASE

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Your help is needed in connection with a proposed new law that will create a national clearinghouse for DOT drug and alcohol results!

This week the Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure will consider a long-term reauthorization and reform of federal surface transportation programs, a key component of the American Energy and Infrastructure Jobs Act.  Subtitle D – Commercial Motor Vehicle Operators creates a national clearinghouse for records related to alcohol and controlled substances testing of commercial motor vehicle operators.  Access to the clearinghouse records is limited to employers and individual drivers.  There is no third party access and in fact third party access by service agents in violation of the section carries civil and criminal penalties.   That means that our company will not be able to assist you in obtaining these records and we will not be able to include them as part of a pre-employment background check report!

Your help is needed – outreach to House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee members to voice disapproval with the lack of third party access is critical.  It is important that third party access to clearinghouse records be allowed as it provides for a complete background report to be prepared promptly and in one place for a motor carrier company.

Additionally, outreach to subcommittee members listed below depending on whether you are located in their district is critical as well.  All can be reached by calling the U.S. Capitol Switchboard is 202-224-3121 and ask to be transferred to the appropriate office.

• Representative John Mica (7^th-FL) – Chairman of the full Committee
• Representative Nick Rahall (3^rd-WV) – Ranking Member of the full Committee
• Representative John Duncan (2^nd-TN) – Chairman of the Highways and Transit Subcommittee
• Representative Peter DeFazio (4^th-OR) – Ranking Member of the Highways and Transit Subcommittee
• Representative Rick Crawford (1^st-AR) – Rep. Crawford is the House lead on the Safe Roads Act, which is essentially what was included in Subtitle D as the national clearinghouse for records related to alcohol and controlled substances testing of commercial motor vehicle operators.

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I love technology. I believe I am part of the majority. In general, it makes personal and professional tasks easier to complete. For personal use, I appreciate using my web cam to talk to family all around the world. Professionally, I implement new technology anywhere I can. Like so many of us, we are tasked to do more with less. Why not use technology to make life easier?

Technology evolves every single day and I am grateful that it does. For instance, when you think about the background check industry and where it has been and where it is today, you can thank heaven and earth for technology. Back then, private investigators would receive a full résumé, sit with the candidate and then conduct a neighborhood canvas and visit every previous employer (yes including travel) to complete a background check. Yikes!

In the…

• 70’s, microfiche and snail mail was used.
• 80’s, the fax machine was in full-force use.
• 90’s, the Internet came into our lives and we can thank Al Gore for his achievement.
• Early 00’s, the advent of the Internet pushed data entry from screening companies to HR departments.
• Late 00’s, HR departments downsized and screening companies and HR agreed that the applicant should enter in their own data.

Well, here we are, 2012. We are grateful to see the unemployment rate slowly going down. However, as our departments slowly increase in numbers, we still have the enormous pressure to do so much in such little time. Like so many, we need to think of ways to cut corners with the use of technology without comprising important aspects of our work. HR is the full cycle management of people – alpha to omega. Not an easy endeavor. As a result, when we have the power to leverage technology offered by our vendors, we need to give it some serious thought.

Most recently, Credential Check started to offer… The APPOL™, which stands for Apply Online.  The APPOL™ is a proprietary tool that provides simplification through automation (automating the “yuk” work).  It allows a company to paperlessly manage the entire candidate process.  Imagine the ability to collect a candidate’s application, process their background checks and drug testing, send them their new hire paperwork and notify other departments about a new employee starting with the appropriate information they need to setup a computer, phone and badge.  Credential Check also honed in on the needs of the HR professional by providing real-time dashboards that track most key HR statistics including hired vs. not hired, total background checks vs. total applications, cost, turnaround time from application to hire and many others.  See what the APPOL™ can do for you (www.credentialcheck.com)! At RECON, we look forward to using this technology ourselves and well as introducing it our clients.

I am always thinking of ways to make life easier – personally and professionally. For 2012, are you?

Sally-Ann Cooke, MSHROD, PHR, CHRP
Client, RECON Management Systems

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I enjoy listening to people when they speak about their profession. Acronyms have become so common place in the working world that it almost requires a dictionary for each new employee to understand what people are saying.

Why would the background check profession be any different? It is not. In the past week I have heard from not less than a half dozen prospects refer to the types of searches they are conducting as National Criminal Searches and they believe that they are receiving a report that checks every court in the United States. They firmly believe that their supplier is checking at the County Court level and when we compare their reports they are not pleased that what they thought and what they are receiving are not the same.

So: What is a 168? A 168 is the number of hours in a week – which is terminology generally used in the staffing profession and more specifically within the Security Officer profession regarding the hours of coverage per shift in a week.

Answer: 24 hours a day (times) 7 days a week (equals) 168 hours
 

Let me shed some light on the terms:

Federal – State – National

with regards to criminal records.

 


Federal: A federal crime is an action that is illegal according to federal law, which means it is a crime throughout the entire country no matter where it is committed.

State: a state crime is something against the law of a given state; state crimes vary greatly throughout the country — as do the punishments attached to them.

National: a commonly used term meaning the United States – which does not have any correlation to our court systems. In other words – slang. J

Note: Sometimes a federal crime and a state crime overlap and the perpetrator could be charged with either offense; the United States Constitution’s Supremacy Clause, though, provides that the federal government take authority over the case, which means the offender will be tried through the federal system.

Some common examples of Federal crimes include the following:

• Bribery
• Computer crimes/hacking
• Counterfeiting of currency
• Embezzlement
• Forgery
• Immigration violations
• Insurance Fraud
• Kidnapping
• Mail fraud and other crimes concerning the postal service
• Racketeering
• Securities fraud
• Tax evasion and fraud

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Many HR professionals request background checks to include information that may not be utilized in the hiring decision. If your company has a blanket policy – it is time to review and update.

Credential Check has created an auditing tool to assist you with the evaluation of your screening program. The ListenFirst Client Needs Analysis™. If you are willing to invest 15 – 20 minutes we will provide you with an evaluation based on the above criteria. In today’s Conscious Commerce society it is no longer just who you know but also the value they can provide to your company.

Pepsi Beverages pays $3.1M in racial bias case

By SAM HANANEL, Associated Press–1 hour ago

WASHINGTON (AP) — Pepsi Beverages Co. will pay $3.1 million to settle federal charges of race discrimination for using criminal background checks to screen out job applicants — even if they weren’t convicted of a crime.

The settlement announced Wednesday with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission is part of a national government crackdown on hiring policies that can hurt blacks and Hispanics.

EEOC officials said the company’s policy of not hiring workers with arrest records disproportionately excluded more than 300 black applicants. The policy barred applicants who had been arrested, but not convicted of a crime, and denied employment to others who were convicted of minor offenses.

Using arrest and conviction records to deny employment can be illegal if it’s irrelevant for the job, according to the EEOC, which enforces the nation’s employment discrimination laws. The agency says such blanket policies can limit job opportunities for minorities with higher arrest and conviction rates than whites.

The company has since adopted a new criminal background policy and plans to make jobs available to victims of the old policy if they are still interested in jobs at Pepsi and are qualified for the openings.

"I commend Pepsi’s willingness to reexamine its policy and modify it to ensure that unwarranted roadblocks to employment are removed," EEOC Chairwoman Jacqueline Berrien said in a statement.

Pepsi Beverage spokesman Dave DeCecco said the company’s criminal background check policy has always been neutral and that the EEOC did not find any intentional discrimination. He said after the issue was first raised in 2006, the company worked with the EEOC to revise its background check process "to create a workplace that is as diverse and inclusive as possible."

"We are committed to promoting diversity and inclusion and we have been widely recognized for our efforts for decades," DeCecco said.

He said the new policy would take a more "individualized approach" in considering the applicant’s criminal history against the particular job being sought.

Pepsi Beverages is PepsiCo’s beverage manufacturing, sales and distribution operating unit in the United States, Canada and Mexico.

Under the settlement, the company will provide the EEOC with regular reports on its hiring practices and offer antidiscrimination training to its hiring personnel and managers.

About 73 percent of major employers report that they always check on applicants’ criminal records, while 19 percent do so for select job candidates, according to a 2010 survey by the Society for Human Resource Management.

But increased federal scrutiny of such policies has led some companies to reevaluate their hiring process. Pamela Devata, a Chicago employment lawyer who has represented companies trying to comply with EEOC’s requirements, said there has been an uptick over the past year in EEOC charges over the use of background checks.

"The EEOC has taken a very aggressive enforcement posture on the use of criminal background and criminal history," Devata said.

The commission held a special meeting on the topic last summer, and Devata said employers have been expecting the EEOC to issue more specific guidance.

EEOC officials have said, for example, that an old drunken driving conviction may not be relevant to a clerical job, but a theft conviction may disqualify someone from working at a bank.

Julie Schmid, acting director of the EEOC’s Minneapolis office, said the EEOC recommends that employers consider the nature and gravity of offenses, the time that has passed since conviction or completion of a sentence, and the nature of the job sought.

"We hope that employers with unnecessarily broad criminal background check policies take note of this agreement and reassess their policies to ensure compliance" with antidiscrimination laws, Schmid said in a written statement.

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To comply with the FCRA an employer’s responsibilities include the following

• Disclose the intent to obtain a consumer report;
• Obtain authorization from the candidate to obtain a consumer report;
• Provide the candidate with pre-adverse action notice if the employer plans to take an adverse action based in whole or in part on information contained in the consumer report which includes instructions on how to dispute the reported information; and
• Provide the candidate with an adverse action notice after taking adverse action based in whole or in part on information contained in the consumer report which is sent after a reasonable* amount of time from when the Pre-Adverse Action Notification was sent.

*Note: The EEOC has issued an opinion letter regarding a reasonable amount of time being five business days.

Now is a great time to implement these policies within your company! For help with this or any other background screening needs, call Credential Check at (888) 689-2000.

Happy New Year!

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California is the latest state to place restrictions on the use of a person’s credit history in the hiring decision. Following states such as Connecticut, Oregon, Washington and Hawaii, California is now the seventh state to limit the use of a credit report in the hiring decision. Proponents of the bill, AB 22, state that unless a person has direct fiduciary responsibility or handles a large amount of cash daily, that a person’s individual financial history has no bearing on job capability or job performance. States have begun placing greater restrictions on employers because of the personal toll that the economic downturn and unemployment levels take on people.

If you have any questions, please call Credential Check Corporation at (888) 689-2000 or consult your attorney!

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TROY, Mich. September 6, 2011—Staff members from Credential Check Corporation have been selected to receive the Crain’s Cool Places to Work award. This marks the third year that Credential Check has been selected as a top employer in the state of Michigan. Credential Check is proud to offer their employees extensive benefits including time off to volunteer, telecommuting program, 401k matching and excellent health coverage.
Credential Check was the only firm there that specializes in background checks. Credential Check is committed to providing background checks with a high level of service to its growing client list. This requires a dedicated staff of trained employees on hand to meet clients’ needs and special requests. According to Cynthia Pariseau, Manager of Administrative Services, “Credential Check Corporation is excited and proud to have been selected as a Cool Place to Work,” by Crain’s Detroit Business and the American Society of Employers. Michael Pachuta, President, stated “Our employees are the greatest asset at Credential Check, we are proud of what they have accomplished and we are committed to helping them grow personally and professionally.”

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Exceptions to this Act include financial institutions and positions where the credit history is “substantially related to the employee’s current or potential job.”

If you have any questions, please call Credential Check Corporation at (888) 689-2000 or consult your attorney!

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