You may be subject to a background check by a private investigator when applying for a job. What are corporate employers looking for and what are your rights?
Thomas Martin, President of Martin Investigative Services Inc. (martinpi.com), headquartered in Newport Beach, has been conducting background checks on behalf of corporations in the United States and abroad since 1982. A former supervisory federal agent with the Department of Justice, he taught interviewing, interrogation and related topics in 60 countries. Martin now leads a team of former FBI, DEA, IRS or Secret Service agents. Their pre-employment investigations – occurring largely in beverage, trucking and transportation and nursery/garden centers – are designed to curb theft of time, money or product.
Not all investigative services favor such depth. Richard Decker, CEO of Criminology Consulting of Charleston in the Charleston suburb of Summerville, South Carolina, found as a PI that companies dig too far into financial records. They should be so thorough if the information is relevant to a job, such as “where you’ll have access to large amounts of cash as a representative to the company or as police officer, where you have unusual access to a person’s private information to complete an investigation,” he says. FULL ARTICLE