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Do employers conduct background checks before they offer a position? Back in the day, the background check was done after the candidate accepted the position.
The process depends on the company and the hiring situation. Most companies wait until you have at least accepted the offer before going through the process of making sure you are cleared to be part of the company.
After that it depends on when you are starting. For example, I started a job in July of 2013 but accepted the offer in November of 2012. The company waited until that spring to do the background check. If you were starting in two weeks, the check would probably be done sooner.
The best thing to do is to ask the HR contact about their specific hiring process and what company they use to do the check.
The answer goes back to the point I made. There are parts of a background check. Companies may check references, which can part of the check.
But because the other parts, (running a CORI to see if you have a record, credit check, or drug test) take longer for the results to come in. They are normally not done until after the offer stage. The offer almost always, in clear language, says contingent on a successful background check.
To think otherwise makes little sense. Unless the job is upper-level companies are not paying to test and run CORI checks on a person unless it is a potential employee.
Those more extensive parts are usually not done until after you have accepted the offer.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by mialia
Often times offers are contingency based. "we offer you this job blah blah blah CONTINGENT upon a successful background check."
translation: don't give your notice to your employer until the check clears.
This is the way we do it, and besides the background check, the reference checks. Too much time/cost to do them all for every person interviewed.
The time to conduct the check depends on the level of security required for that position. A simple background check may only take a day or two, others as much as two weeks.
Typically they make the offer but tell you the offer is contingent on Background Check & Drug Screening. You usually have X days to get to the place that does your drug screen test. Often 3-4 days. They will give a deadline date/time which drug screening must be completed and often you are considered as failing if you miss the deadline.
They also start the background check as soon as you accept the offer.
So the drug screen and background check is taking place at the same time, just after you ACCEPT the offer, but before your start date. Typically, companies will not allow you to start work until the drug test and background check has come back satisfactory. Of course, not all companies perform Drug Tests and/or Background Checks.
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