What You Absolutely Must Know Before Ordering a Crimin

al Background Check
Need to conduct a criminal background check on someone (a prospective investor,
a potential date, a suspicious-acting neighbor, etc.)?
Good news: The U.S. Is one of the few countries in the world where you can chec
k to see is someone has a criminal record without their express permission (pro
vided you are not using the criminal background check for employment or credit-g
ranting purposes). In other words, criminal records are generally considered pu
blic records here.
But though public access to criminal records is more open in the U.S. than in mo
st countries, it's still less comprehensive than it could be.
The only truly comprehensive repository of U.S. criminal records is the FBI's Na
tional Crime Information Center (NCIC) database, which is national in coverage a
nd updated daily. But private citizens and businesses do not, as a general rule,
have access to this FBI database.
Instead, the public must search on a state-by-state basis, or in some states, on
a on a county-by-county basis (the latter occurs in a few states which do not p
rovide statewide criminal records searches to the public).
Today, you can easily order criminal background checks online, through any of in
numerable websites offering this service. But before you jump, read on. You re
ally need to understand the type of info that's available to the public and the
types of searches that can be conducted before you plunk down your money. Fran
kly, there are more than a few online companies out there that do shoddy, incomp
lete criminal records searches, and may well report that your subject is clean wh
en in fact he/she has a rap sheet a yard long! Knowledge is power -- learn a li
ttle about criminal background checks BEFORE you order one.
DATABASE VS. ON-SITE SEARCHES
There are two ways to run criminal background checks -- by means of statewide da
tabase searches or by having a researcher personally visit courthouses and searc
h the records for you in person.
There are advantages and disadvantages to each method.
Statewide database searches are quick and relatively inexpensive. But these stat
ewide databases have to be compiled from information submitted by the counties,
and this takes time. So such databases are€
always somewhat out of date. Also, there may be some counties in a state which f
ail to report their data, in which case the database search is providing less-th
an-complete results.
BUYER BEWARE: Virtually all Internet websites offering you "instant" criminal b
ackground checks are using statewide databases. BE CAREFUL to review the "Covera
ge" of those databases. You may be surprised to find that a search claiming to c
over California, for example, is in reality covering only half or less of Califo
rnia's counties.
That's why database searches alone are not adequate for situations where timelin
ess and completeness are vital, such as pre-employment screening. Although datab
ase searches allow you to search a wide geographic area inexpensively, it's a go
od idea to utilize the other type of criminal search as well -- hiring a researc
her to search courthouse records€in person.
In on-site searching, timeliness and thoroughness are assured. But this type of
criminal search method also has a disadvantage -- you only get results for a sin
gle county (assuming you're only having the on-site search done in one county).
HOW TO SEARCH
For many applications, the best strategy is to use both methods of search, that
is, to order an on-site search for the subject's county of residence plus a data
base search for his/her state of residence. That way, you're getting very timely
and complete results for his/her county and at the same time searching a wider
area as a precaution (you can of course also order nationwide criminal database
searches online).
You should always start with a Social Security Number Trace (SSN Trace), which w
ill reveal your subject's address history, i.e., Where has he/she resided withi
n the past seven years?
Once you know this, you know where to search for criminal records.
Seven years is the maximum time period generally used in pre-employment screenin
g. However, if your search is not employment related, it may be permissible to s
earch even further back.
ALIASES
Also, always conduct searches on any aliases your subject has associated with hi
s or her SSN. For example, if the SSN Trace reveals that your subject Pat Warner
has also used the name Ron Warner€
(Ron being his middle name), search on the name Ron Warner as well. This costs a
little more but is necessary for completeness, for the obvious reason that your
subject may have committed a crime and then been convicted under an alias. If y
our subject has more than one alias (which is unusual) you should search on all
of them.
Note that a female subject should be searched using her maiden name if she's got
ten married within the past seven years.
BUYER BEWARE: Most criminal background checks you can order on the Internet sim
ply skip this vital step of checking aliases and maiden names. That way, these w
ebsites are able to offer you a low price for what seems to be a valid criminal
background check. However, such searches are completely unreliable. Make sure th
at, whomever you order these searches from, they're doing a complete and thoroug
h job! An incomplete criminal background check may well turn out to be much wor
se than none at all.
Joseph Ryan is Director of Washington Research Associates Inc. This article is
excerpted from the company's website. To read the complete original article or
to order a criminal background check or pre-employment background check please g
o to http://www.E-CriminalBackgroundCheck.net (for criminal background checks),
or http://www.E-EmploymentScreening.net (for pre-employment background checks).