Archive

Posts Tagged ‘best background check site’

Can You Really Trust Online Background Checks?

September 11th, 2009

In the modern age, we all use the world wide web for all sorts of things that would have been hard to imagine not so very long ago. Information used to be a lot harder for us to find, but these days all you really have to do is spend a few minutes on the web and you can easily find out all sorts of things about a person’s background. But while it may be easy and quick to get that info, is it info that you can really trust to be true?

Not too long after my 18th birthday, I was busted for underage drinking. Years went by, and then a few years ago I had an interview for a job I really wanted. I was nervous that when they did a check of my background they’d find that old offense, and I’d miss out on a really good job because of some stupid little thing I did a long time ago, when I was still just a kid.

Fortunately I was able to find a website that allowed me to run a background check on myself, so I could actually see everything about my history that my potential employers would be able to find out. I was quite relieved to disocver that my old underage drinking charge wasn’t on my report after all, but I did have some tickets for speeding that I hadn’t dealt with. So, I left the alcohol charge off of my application for the job, but I did mention the tickets, and in the end, I did get the job.

Maybe it would feel sort of wrong for you to leave something like that off of a job application. If so, I’ll admit that I can relate. But at the same time, I think we are entitled to our privacy, and we should be able to put our old mistakes behind us and get on with our lives. Besides, in this economy it’s already a real challenge to land any job at all. I really needed to get that job, and it was a very big relief for me to discover that online background check, so I could have access to the exact same material about myself that my potential employers would find. Thanks to that background check, I knew just what things I had to include on my application, and what things I could afford to leave off of it.

Background Checks , , , , , , , , , ,