The pre-employment background screening includes verifying an applicant’s past employment, education, identity, and criminal history. This complex process requires familiarity with governing laws around human rights and privacy.
High-quality pre-employment background screening can help companies make better hiring decisions, create a safer work environment, and comply with regulations. But what are the benefits?
Reduced Risk of Fraud
Hiring the wrong employee can cost your company money in several ways, including recruitment costs, initial wages for the new hire, training expenses, and potential legal fees. It can also negatively impact client relations, brand reputation, and sales.
Fraudulent claims by employees – including theft of funds, inventory, equipment, and assets, misappropriation of corporate resources, and financial statement fraud – account for 86 percent of all internal fraud cases. Pre-employment screening helps you avoid hiring people with criminal records, credit issues, and other red flags that could cause harm to your business or its clients.
It can also help you avoid hiring people who have fabricated their credentials, for example, by inflating university grades, changing job titles, or creating deep fakes on social media. While federal laws set some ground rules for background checks, the process is largely governed by state and local laws.
Increased Productivity
Making a poor hiring decision can have a big financial impact on a business. Finding, hiring, and training a new employee not only costs money and time but also incurs expenses due to lost productivity as the new hire gets used to their new position.
Background checks and assessments help to ensure that candidates are qualified for the position, resulting in reduced hiring costs and a better-quality workforce. It also helps to promote a safe work environment by identifying potential risks, such as dishonest or fraudulent activity, which can cause harm to a company. In the end, this results in a more prosperous and productive company. It also lessens a company’s legal responsibility and guards against reputational harm. It also lessens the requirement to rescreen current workers.
Better Hiring Decisions
When hiring managers can access reliable information on candidates, they can make better decisions and create a more efficient and effective workforce. This can also help businesses avoid legal issues and maintain a safe work environment.
We weed out bad candidates and those with something to hide before investing more time in hiring. This can save valuable company resources and money in the long run.
Verification of education, career history, personal references, and driving records are all part of pre-employment background investigations. To guarantee that workers are not using drugs at work and to assist in decreasing accidents at the workplace, they might also incorporate a drug test. By confirming an employee’s character and ensuring they are of a high caliber, they may also stop internal stealing.
Reduced Employee Turnover
Employee turnover can be costly to businesses. When a company spends money recruiting, hiring, training, and supporting a new employee, that investment is essentially lost when that person eventually leaves the job.
Using pre-employment screening tools can help to reduce the rate of employee turnover. These tools can include verification of employment history, education, references, credit checks, motor vehicle records, and more.
Employers may also make better recruiting judgments by using this screening to find any possible problems before hiring someone. This can save the organization money, time, and headaches in the long term. Additionally, it may guarantee that workers are a suitable fit for the company culture, increasing worker happiness.
Increased Job Satisfaction
Taking the time to screen potential employees properly can help avoid costly errors and legal issues. Additionally, by ensuring a candidate is the right fit for the company, pre-employment background screening can lead to higher job satisfaction among employees.
Some types of pre-employment screenings include checking criminal records, credit checks (particularly important for positions dealing with large amounts of money), and motor vehicle record searches. Other types of screenings include confirming academic credentials and conducting social media monitoring.
Pre-employment background screening benefits businesses, including reducing employee turnover, increasing productivity, and providing a safe work environment. It can also help employers make better hiring decisions and maintain compliance with industry regulations.