EmployeeScreenIQ Blog

So CareerBuilder created a Do’s and Dont’s article for those looking for jobs as a follow up to their Social Networking study about background checks which was released last month.  Advice includes:

• Do Update Your Profile Regularly
• Don’t Badmouth Your Current or Past Employers
• Do Join Groups Selectively
• Don’t Mention Your Job Search if You are Still Employed
• Don’t Forget That Others Can See Your Friends

It’s pretty good advice, but they forgot the most important advice of all: Don’t Make Your Profile Public! I’m surprised by the omission.  If people that you don’t allow in can’t see your profile, then all of the above advice becomes a moot point.

Also on the topic of Social Networking and Background Checks was a great OpEd piece published in the Miami Herald by Mark Neuberger, labor and employment attorney for Foley & Lardner LLP.  Mark made provides an interesting analogy to to this practice by comparing it to pre-civil rights days.

“Before the Civil Rights Act, it was common for companies to require applicants to submit a photograph and routinely ask about religion, marital status and number of children. This information affected decisions regarding hiring, compensation and promotions. The widespread practice was that the ”family guy with kids” deserved the promotion and more money because he needed it and the single female did not.”

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It’s an interesting take, but at the end of the day, the comparison is entirely valid.  Even if you are not factoring things such as race, age, gender, sexual orientation, etc. into your search, the old saying still holds true.  “You Can’t Unring That Bell”.

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Check out our podcast of This Week in Background Checks from the Week of November 3rd.  Topics discussed include:

• Recap of the ERE Conference
• Governor of Ohio’s Background Check on “Joe The Plumber”
• Affects of the Presidential Election on Background
• FTC Red Flags Guidelines
• Fake Claims of Military Honors

Enjoy!  Have a great weekend.

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Greetings from the booth #219 at ERE Fall Expo in sunny, but not so warm Hollywood Beach, Florida.  There appear to be a number of attendees at this conference, which leads me to my first question: Why is everyone waiting in line for food when they could be talking to us about background checks?  C’mon people, we’re raffling off a Nintendo Wii, and you know conference food usually stinks.

On a serious note, ERE decided to broadcast a live feed of the conference on their website.  Very innovative, but I wonder if doing so both now and in the future will discourage people from attending.  Why spend the money or the time at the conference, when you can just tune in for the sessions that interest you?  Of course, a live feed can’t replicate perhaps the most important part of any conference, networking.

I attended a great panel discussion about cutting technology in staffing, moderated by Gerry Crispin and Mark Mehler of CareerXRoads and featuring Cheezhead’s Joel Cheesman.  They most technologies they mentioned most were Twitter, SMS messaging, and IM.  Wouldn’t it be great if background checks could be done that way?  Maybe in the future!

Anyway, back to the conference.  Things picked up since I started this post.  We’re going to be doing a podcast with Steve Curtis from iCIMS’ in a little bit.  I’ll keep you posted.

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The Daily Monitor, a Ugandan newspaper, has exposed a con taking place at the country’s largest and oldest university.  Makerere University has become the target of a degree fraud scam most likely perpetrated by members of its own staff and a contractor hired to speed up the degree issuance process.  The newspaper was able obtain a fake transcript from the university and then receive verification from the Academic Registrar that the transcript was genuine.

This is a trend that I think will definitely increase over the next few years and criminals get smarter and technology becomes more advanced.  Schools should conduct background checks on employees that will have access to confidential student information and important tasks such as issuing degrees and awarding financial aid.  There are numerous opportunities to commit fraud in these areas.  Schools need to recognize this and protect themselves as much as possible.

In addition, employers should always conduct education verifications on prospective employees whose position requires a certain level of education and/or a primary course of study.  There is no question that fake degrees are being sold worldwide.  The question is:  Who’s buying?  Could it be your applicant?

Makerere certifies fake transcripts

By Edwin Nuwagaba – October 27, 2008

Kampala

A criminal gang in Kampala is selling fake degree transcripts from Makerere University at Shs250,000, a Daily Monitor investigation can reveal.

While the trade in fake transcripts has been going on for many months, the forgery has become so sophisticated that the university cannot distinguish the fake transcripts they issue from genuine ones.

Following earlier reports of its transcripts being forged, Makerere set up an office earlier in the year to help employers vet documents submitted by prospective employees. However, the racket, which has contacts within the university, issues ‘fool-proof’ transcripts that the office cannot identify as being forged, leaving thousands of employers vulnerable to applicants getting jobs for which they are not qualified.

In an effort to expose the loopholes in the verification process, Daily Monitor paid a racket member Shs250,000 for a fake transcript which came with a certified copy. When Daily Monitor submitted the fake transcript to the university for verification, it was certified as a genuine transcript.

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Be sure to check out our Internal Resource for Identifying Known Diploma Mills.  It can be downloaded at http://university.employeescreen.com/white_papers

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The folks over at HR.BLR.com just published a fascinating story entitled, Court Ponders Implications of Deceitful Resume.  A company employee was terminated when fellow employees alleged sexual harassment.  This gentleman was on an employment contract which included a severance provision.  The employer then investigated the employee and found that he had committed resume fraud to get the job and that he was not entitled to the severance package.

The court ruled that the employer had an opportunity to discover the resume fraud before they extended a job offer and therefore was liable for the severance.  This should serve as a lesson to employers that background checks which include Employment Verifications are vital to ensuring you hire the best candidate for the job.

Court Ponders Implications of Deceitful Resume

What the court said.

The question was whether the man’s alleged fraud was sufficient basis for NMHC to rescind his contract. The appellate court pointed out that the testimony at trial showed that NMHC, its recruiter, and its interviewers failed to ascertain the truth about his employment history, though it appeared to have been readily available via background checks and calls to former employers. The recruiter testified that NMHC had not authorized him to check prior employers. He was only authorized to check references.

Due diligence would have revealed the falsities, the court said, because after the firing, NMHC looked more closely at the  résumé in the hope of showing that the man was terminated for cause and bolstering its claim that he was not entitled to the severance benefits. Based on NMHC’s failure of due diligence, the court agreed that the action to rescind the contract should be dismissed. National Medical Health Card Systems v. Fallarino, Supreme Court of New York, Nassau County, No. 12519/05 (8/25/08).

Point to remember:

This ruling suggests that when employers don’t thoroughly investigate applicants’ backgrounds, they’re in a weak position to try to rescind an employment contract based on a misleading and inaccurate résumé.

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Yesterday, the FTC announced a 6 month delay in enforcing their “Red Flags” Identity Theft Guidelines.  In reading through the release, it was unclear as to how this would affect employers.  Well, we’ve been in touch with the FTC and we now know that this delay only pertains to Financial Institutions and Creditors.  Employers still must be in compliance with the these guidelines as they relate to developing and implementing a policy to handle “Red Flag” Address Discrepancy Notifications from National Consumer Reporting Agencies (primarily credit bureaus) when conducting background checks.

For more information about these guidelines, please refer to the articles listed below.

Users of Consumer Reports Have New Responsibilities as of November 1, 2008

employeescreenIQ Offers Free Webinar on New FTC Identity Theft Guidelines

FTC Enforcement Policy: Identity Theft Red Flags Rule

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The FTC has just announced that they were delaying enforcement of their “Red Flag” rules on Identity Theft until May 1, 2009.  However, it is important to note that these rules are different from the Address Discrepancy Rules we recently conducted a Webinar on with Seyfarth Shaw attorney, Pam Devata.

I just spoke with Pam and it is still her position that employers who are using credit reports should still comply with the November 1, 2008 deadline for having a written policy in place.

We’ll keep you posted as we learn more.

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FoxNews is reporting that a 76 year old New York woman has just been arrested for a 73rd time.  According to the story, “A criminal complaint filed earlier in this case charged Kelly with grand larceny and attempted grand larceny. It said she took a wallet, left by police as bait, from a shopping cart in a supermarket a few blocks north of Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts on Oct. 15. It said an officer recovered the wallet from Kelly’s ‘bra area.’”

I’m thinking that this woman might want to switch to a new line of work.  She clearly hasn’t been a very good crook.  The story also says that she has used 36 aliases since she began her life of not-so-lucrative crime.  Can you imagine what the background check would look like on this?  The paper used alone could rival that of Homer’s The Odyssey.  How about the cost for checking criminal records for a woman with 36 names?  Can you say “National Deficit”? That would be one expensive and time consuming background check.  Yikes!

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According to the Identity Theft Task Force, federal identity theft convictions increased by 26% in 2007 over the previous year.  That is a staggering figure.  An article written by Wired News reports “as many as 1,534 people were convicted in 2006, and a year later, 1,943 were convicted nationwide on various identity theft violations. The report, however, said there are about 1.6 million complaints of identity theft on file with the Federal Trade Commission.”

It’s no wonder the FTC has now decided to enforce its “Red Flags” Guidelines for curbing identity theft which go into effect November 1, 2008.  These new regulations seems to be the best kept secret out there.  However, did you know that among those affected are companies that conduct background checks in their employees?  That’s a pretty big audience, right?  If you aren’t aware of how this affects you, check out our recent webinar which explains what the guidelines are and how to get in compliance.  The Webinar can be downloaded at http://university.employeescreen.com/white_papers

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U.S. Employers have historically been overwhelmed by the cumbersome process of I-9 Forms and compliance with I-9 Regulations. Fines for inaccurately completed I-9 Forms range from $300 to $3000 per occurrence. The Immigration Reform and Control Act (IRCA) mandates that U.S. employers authenticate the employment eligibility status of newly hired employees and makes it illegal for employers to knowingly hire or continue to employ unauthorized workers. As a designated agent for the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), employeescreenIQ ® can automate your I-9 process and allow your company to participate in the DHS E-Verify program. (Previously called the SAVE and/or Basic Pilot Program).

In a recent article on employeescreen University, Nick Fishman writes:

Ask any HR executive about their I-9 process and their eyes begin to water before they can spit the words out. Names spelled wrong, social security numbers don’t match, proper identification isn’t verified. Let’s face it, it’s a time consuming process that often is executed incorrectly and the penalties for lax policies are scary. The Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986 mandates that US employers verify the employment eligibility status of new employees. Until recently, this was accomplished most typically by examining a few pieces of identification while hoping the ID documents were authentic, entering the relevant information on the I-9 form, and filing it away in the employee file. It was pretty much forgotten at this point unless and until the government decided to audit your I-9 files to make sure you were not employing illegal workers. Still, many employers are fined for incorrectly filling out the I-9, even though they are employing legal workers. There was no external oversight or feasible process available to gain assurance that you are indeed employing legal workers, or gain the peace of mind that your documentation was all in order every time.

What Can You Do?

Fortunately, this problem is common to all organizations and now employeescreenIQ offers Employment Eligibility Verification and Electronic I-9 Filing through our partnership with Form I-9 Compliance LLC. These tools can reduce your workload and keep you in compliance. The product that Form I-9 has developed allows employers the ability to fill out a “smart” I-9 form on-line that ensures it is filled out completely and correctly. From there, an employer can simply store the document in an on-line archive or can seamlessly and electronically verify employment eligibility instantly through the Social Security Administration (SSA) and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). Within moments the system will give you a confirmation of the employee’s eligibility or it will indicate a non-confirmation. In occurrences of non-confirmation, the system will walk the employer step by step through the error and illustrate how to resolve the issue. Some of the common issues may be resolved with a few keystrokes. Others require follow-up from both you and your employee; the Form I-9 system will send you regular reminders indicating the number of days your employee has to resolve the non-confirmation. If the non-confirmed employee fails to respond through the appropriate channels within the legally mandated grace period, or if employment eligibility is ultimately found ineligible for employment, the system will indicate that the employee must be terminated. You may continue to employ workers who have received the initial non-confirmation until their employment eligibility has been confirmed through these channels.

The system can also be used for re-verifications, such as when an individual legally changes their name or when a foreign employee’s Green Card expires and is re-issued. The system will track and notify you of upcoming expiration dates for workers without permanent authorization.

Program Features Include:

- Comprehensive and error free electronic I-9 form processing and storage

- Electronic signature module that is fully compliant with the E-Sign Act

- Integration of this electronic process into your background check results

- Instant confirmation of “Right to Work”

- Receive automated alerts 90, 60 and 30 days in advance of the expiration of employees work authorization documents.

- Automated Tentative Non Confirmation (TNC) compliance

Benefits

- Simplify and improve your I-9 process

- Mitigate your risk during I-9 Form Audits

- Allow your company to centralize and automate the entire I-9 Process

- Remove paper from the process

- Removes guesswork from I9 document review during the Form I-9 process

- Allows participating employers to confirm employment eligibility of all newly hired employees

- Improves the accuracy of wage and tax reporting

- Protects jobs for authorized United States workers

Many states are already mandating this process with twenty more states coming on board by the end of the calendar year. While not a part of the background screening process, E-Verify is a critical step in solidifying a reputable workforce. While lobbying with NAPBS® we have found a lot of support for a federal bill requiring full deployment of E-verify within five years. For more information on E-verify feel free to contact us: http://www.employeescreen.com/requests/freedemo.asp

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